Life in Slovenia

2010-03-15T05:56:00.000-07:00

MARCH 2010

We have greatly enjoyed the company of students in Slovenija. Many students are very enthusiastic about using the language that they study for 9 years in school and are excited about speaking with us, helping us and even teaching us. We had a lovely tour of Kanal provided by students of Barbara Kragelj from the Primary School.

Bob and Kanal tour guides

Kanal ob Soči is a village that straddles the Soča River. This village of about 1,500 tells a lengthy and complicated history. The area was settled in prehistoric times and the Romans built the first bridge across the river. The history of this walled city covers generations of Slovenes who were attacked by the Turks, devastated during border wars between Venice and Austria between 1615 and 1617, and they were in the middle of the Tolmin Peasants' Revolt of 1713. They lived under occupation of the Austrians, Napoleon, Austrians again and suffered great destruction during WWI. The bridge that joins both sides of town was destroyed in WWI and rebuilt while under the occupation of the Italians. Now there is great pride in the history, events that celebrate the uniqueness of the village, high diving contests off the bridge into the river, concerts in the courtyard of the old walls and a celebrated international competition men's volley ball team.

Bridge over the Soča River - the moon whole was under water during the most recent flood

The oldest house in Kanal

Church and old walls

2010-03-10T12:56:00.001-08:00

Kred

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2010

A vacation at my own home, in Slovenija with my husband and my friends is the most glorious type of holiday. Our friends have wined and dined me as the prodigal companion returned from the other side of the world and I feel much loved and appreciated. It has been really nice!

Cividale

Except for a visit to Ohio at Christmas Bob has been here since September teaching at his school [the gimnazia] and at my school [the technical center] and maintaining our Slovene life. He has had standing Wednesday, Friday and Sunday invitations for dinner with care packages sent home with him; he has not suffered at all when it comes to food. Our friends really don't believe that even when I am here he does most of the cooking and he is very capable of cooking for himself, but he has been so thankful for the regular companionship and the delicious variety of culinary treats that not a single complaint passes his lips. He has also been invited a lot for coffee, walks, to share special celebrations and share in the daily life of our community. The Slovenes have really shown the beauty of their hospitality. Now that Bob and I are together for a month the kindness and commitment to our friendship continues to overwhelm us. We are truly blessed.

I was surprised how easily I slipped right back into our lives here. The apartment feels comfortable, I know my way around, the activities feel normal and I am delighted that I feel so cozy. I think I need to start using the phrases "at home in Slovenia" and "at home in Ohio" because that is indeed how I feel about this split life. Both places are happy homes.

Milking sheds in the pasture at the base of Krn

When I return to Ohio I do see life through different eyes. The farm living and being surrounded by the natural energy of the deer, birds, woods, fields, gardens and streams is more precious than I ever noticed before. Our garden paradise is a place where I can intimately feel at one with the forces of creation on a daily basis. Even all the snow brought me joy. When we live in Slovenija we are surrounded with another culture and all my senses tell me that I am a stranger here, but a welcome friend. The differences in the culture are beginning to feel normal and even the confusion of language doesn't worry me any more. The natural wonders are so extremely different than Ohio that each time I feel the snow capped mountains, the shimmering turquoise So?a river, the hill top hiking paths, the carpet of wild flowers in the forest and the slice of the burja wind I am thrilled by the uniqueness of the discovery. How can it get any better than this?

Ave Maria on the path to Opatija Selo on the Kras

Opatija, Croatia

Bob surprised me with a holiday vacation in Opatija, Croatia. This coastal city has been a favorite for centuries as the Austrians sought warmer and sunnier escapes from the cold snowy dampness of Vienna. Even Emperor Franz Joseph built a villa at this seaside village and with his blessing the aristocracy competed for the most elaborate retreats. Now there is a seaside walk 12 km long named after the Emperor who hid from the winter at the sea.

Opatija harbor view

Sadly we only had one day of sun and 2 days of pouring down rain. At times the sky blended with the Adriatic Sea and the view from our hotel window was a creative blend of gray. Except for some walking under umbrellas we spent much of our time snuggled in front of the Olympics. Euro-sport showed continuous live broadcasts so we saw sports that American audiences often miss; curling, biathlon, and hockey games played by countries other than the US. The best was watching skating with NO COMMENTARIES so that we could really hear the music and just watch the athletic artistry.

Dodging rainy days we have hiked in Slovenija and Italy amongst the emerging wild flowers. Unfortunately the weather was not the warm spring I was hoping for, but we bundled up and took to the hills any way. We found a great hike from Opatija Selo [not the same Opatija as in Croatia – in Slovene the stress is on the 1st a – in Croatian the stress is on the i ] across the border to Italy and back along the Kras. The path is another WWI road and all along we saw trenches that had been dug into the lime stone or built from limestone rocks. Now bushes and trees trip you as you try to investigate, but on both sides of the path the trenches and the horrible existence of the men who built and lived there haunt the trail. My most common phrase while we are walking in these treacherous hilly areas is “WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?” How could fighting in this bumpy, rocky, steep terrain for 5 years through the worst winters recorded in Europe be a good idea? How did the army communicate when young men from all over the Austrian-Hungarian Empire were conscripted into the army? [languages spoken in the empire were; Bosnian, German, Hungarian, Czech, Polish, Ukrainian, Romanian, Croatian, Slovak, Serbian, Slovene, Russian, Italian] How did women and children survive once the men were dragged from home to fight and how did they manage when every tree was cut down and the military machine was crushing everything in their path? Painful energy remains in these hills and people are still finding harmless remains left behind from the WWI soldiers [photo of a hob nail that attached itself to Bob’s shoe] and sadly when foundations are dug unexploded shells from both wars are still found and sometime to a tragic end.
http://www.urszr.si/eng/page.php?src=pr15.htm

Hob nail

WWI trench

Fortunately I find wonderfully positive energy in this place that overpowers the energy of hate and violence of war. This is a land where people have lived, laughed and loved for thousands of years and the Spiritual forces vibrate strongly. At the times when I feel the most connected to the Spirit of the Earth and all who dwell within, I am reminded to trust by the blue heron who crosses my path. On 7 March over 50 birds waited for me in a field and then gave me a show of circular flight.

Herons flying in Kobarid

2009-11-01T07:20:00.000-08:00

TO VIEW MORE RECENT POSTS GO TO www.kayraplenovich.com
**********************************************************************************

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2009

It was with great excitement and deep sadness that I left Ohio in September. There has been so much to do since the death of my father in May and still so much to do to help my mother in her first year of living alone. But I had a return ticket with Bob so I took a much needed vacation in Slovenija for 7 weeks.

Since our time together was short we consciously spent lots of time overflowing our days with new moments of wonder and revisiting places of great delight. It is amazing how quickly we filled the 7 weeks with adventure and were still able to sleep in our own bed.

The highlight of our time together was hiking in the mountains.

Beautiful weather, good friends, wandering the paths, following Roman roads, long distance vistas made every hiking moment another blink in time to be cherished.

There were lots of festivals with local food, music, costumes crowds of people speaking a huge variety of languages and beauty beyond description.

The most fascinating day trip was visiting two Italian villages that had been destroyed during the 1976 earthquake. Both cities nestle at the base of the mountains and were in the center of destruction from the first quake and then the aftershock. The villages have been meticulously restored to the original medieval style using as many original materials as possible, but freschi were lost and some buildings were left in crumbles as a memorial to the disaster that killed many and left everyone homeless and living in tents for years.

Now that I am in Ohio and Bob is in Slovenija the memory that paints the biggest smile is Bob playing Uncle Rich’s accordion while our Slovene friends sing along.

2009-02-20T14:04:00.000-08:00

FEBRUARY 2009 - PUST

The last of winter fought hard rumbling the earth, throwing lightening bolts, covering the umbrellas with wet snow and screaming his dislike for being frightened away.

Spring came on Shrove Tuesday and the Kurent were here in Šempeter shaking their bells scaring the winter away. Pustovanje or Kurentovanje is the traditional pre-Christian Slovene celebration of the end of the cold and dark winter and the hope of spring. Many of the villages are nestled in valleys high in the mountains and the days are extremely short, the sun does not hit the house for long in the day and the darkness goes on forever. This year there was an excess of snow in the mountains [in some high altitudes 9 feet] and the celebration of spring was felt all around the country.

Pustovanje is now a community celebration with parades, gatherings in town centers, children dressed as every imaginable fantasy character [Pippilongstocking and Ninja Turtles seemed to be the favorites], floats expressing a political themes, and demonstrations by the Kurenti.

The Kurenti are traditional Slavic creatures who scare away the winter allowing spring to come. In the past they wandered around town from house to house scaring away evil spirits with the cow bells that hang as a belt around their waist.The Kurent costume is sheep's wool with furry head pieces decorated with horns, feathers, sticks and colorful streamers. The masks are elaborate folk art made of beautifully tooled leather and worn to completely disguise the wearer. The Kurenti came from the Maribor region in Eastern part of the country by bus to dance down the main street of Šempeter making lots of noise, hugging the girls, bouncing with them down the street, and generally creating joyful mayhem.

We also went to Cerknov for their celebration. Cerknov is a village in the mountains with a tragic history. During WWII there was a Partisan school in the town and Germans soldiers climbed the bell tower of the church with guns and butchered 40 young students as they were walking innocently on the streets. The isolated roads to Cerknov wind up, down and around the mountains through narrow passes where barely two small cars can travel. It took us more than an hour to get there for their unique celebration.

The characters in this village are Cerkljanski Laufarji, and the masks are typically worn by young men of age. The central Laufar figure is Pust carrying a young spruce tree and dressed in a costume made of fresh moss scraped off rocks in the forest. He is accompanied by the family of 25 mute Laufarji in wooden masks and appropriate natural costumes. For months people of the village prepare the costumes and then the Larufarji parade around town and then gather on the stage set up in the center square. There for over an hour the problems of the past year are read and commented on by the judges. We could understand very little, and even our Slovene friends were having a difficult time understanding because the dialect was so different that it was often incomprehensible to them, but it was clear that the mayor [Župan] was getting a lot of attention and discussion about the road construction that is taking a life time also seemed to surface quite a lot. The Pust is blamed for all the problems of the year and is supposedly sentenced to death by a woodman's mallet. We missed the finale so I have no idea what happened to the masked moss covered man, but it simply became too cold to stand listening to the local gossip without being able to understand. We found a cozy cafe for hot tea while the rest of the community listened and laughed.

I adore these local festivals that evolved as a way of dealing with and understanding life. Once Christianity became the pervasive culture, the old cultures began to die or were absorbed into the Christian traditions [hence spring celebrations occurring on the Tuesday before Lent begins]. Christianity is the great leveler; everyone believes the same thing [although their are certainly an abundance of variations], all the holidays were dictated by the church [and now tradition] and the need for dealing with the natural world became suspect and viewed as pagan, evil, and now not modern. Because the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation only the native people have traditions of the »old ways«, it simply is not a part of our being, yet I feel the changes of the moon and the pulse of spring and I too want to don a costume and dance wildly in the streets.

2008-12-28T14:16:00.000-08:00

TO VIEW MORE RECENT ENTRIES GO TO www.kayraplenovich.com
***************************************************************

CHRISTMAS 2008

Christmas was peaceful this year. I couldn’t wear shoes, so I couldn’t go anywhere. After the surgery my foot is healing beautifully, but shoes are cursed things!! So I lounged on the sofa, foot in the air reading books, watching movies and enjoying the Christmas tree. After two weeks of this life of resting I went to get my hair cut and I couldn’t believe how relaxed I looked in the disgustingly huge mirror lit with florescent lights. I haven’t looked this young and rested in 20 years. A life of leisure suits me.

Sveta Gora Nativity

Christmas was spent singing in Sveta Gora. After 4 years in this freezing church I have learned to layer with wool, wrap in scarves, double gloves and jump up and down when ever appropriate. I have also learned some of the traditional songs and I can even sing parts of them from memory in Slovene. It is a very good feeling.

"Holy Family at Sveta Gora"

**********************************************************************************

WINTER SOLSTICE

We went to the Santuary of Madonna di Castelmonte [Stara Gora] for the winter solstice. Even though this mountaintop shrine is a religious monastery and the Cappuccini Friars might frown on acknowledgment of the pagan, it was a top of the world location to watch the shortest day of the year turn into the cold of night. Ancient Slovene tradition was to burn bon fires on the winter solstice because the fires and their warmth kept the life of the old sun Svarog from dying before the new sun Svarožic was born out of the longest night of the year, and they were also supposed to save the soil from freezing deeply in the winter. During the dark days people also feared attack from wolves, the wild man o f the night [ponocni mož], the woman from the mountain cave [Zlata baba] and other mysterious creatures. Even after Christianity became the dominant faith the fear changed to devils, and witches roaming during the long nights of a cold winter. We saw no bon fires, but as the burja wind can rise to over 100 miles per hour it is easy to imagine that the sharp blade of the wind along with the haunting sounds could conjure up the belief in many things to fear in the darkness.

Solstice sunset

Castelmonte rises high above the Friulian plain and has been a pilgrimage site since the 1100’s and a strategic point of protection of Friuli for centuries. In 1913 the Cappuccini monks were given guardianship of the shrine that was then attacked by German forces in November 1943. The church is a blend of the ancient with the painted dark skinned stone Madonna from the 13th century to the front façade and interior front walls that must have been rebuilt after the bombing with a style of the times. From the monastery the view is to the Adriatic Sea, the Dolimiti and Julian Alps and across the flat plains of Friuli. When the tourists are gone it must be the perfect place to meditate on the wonder of the creation. There are so many majestic hill top views in this area and I never tire of watching in silent meditation.

Castlemonte crosses

The Cappuccini monks wear dark brown hooded robes and the drink of the same name, cappuccino, is so called because the spike of foam is shaped like the hood [cappuccio] and the color of the coffee and milk mixture is the same color as the robe. Some even credit Marco d’Aviano an itinerate Cappuccin monk for discovering the drink, but that is probably just a tall tale unless he took his steam milk machine on the road with him. He is historically credited with gathering Protestants and Catholics to join together in stopping the invasion of Vienna by the Ottoman Turks in 1683. Supposedly following the victory the Viennese found sacks of strong infidel Turkish coffee left by the retreating army and since it was too strong for their refined tastes they diluted it with cream and honey, named it after a monk in a brown robe and convinced the whole world to drink it. But don’t drink it in Italy in the afternoon. Milk after a meal is not good for your stomach so just plain espresso is what you drink following a meal. Ordering a cappuccino after a meal is a sure sign of “tourist”, but pronunciation may have hinted “non local”.
Sources:

http://www.cappuccinivenezia.org/castelm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2979993.stm

**********************************************************************************

HOSPITAL STAY

The tall pink and blue building is the Šempeter hospital - on a clear day you can see Italy and the mountains.

On December 11 I had surgery on my foot. I had a node [or a horn as my doctor called it] on the top of my right foot at the big toe due to osteoarthritis [like a bunion]. The condition has been progressing nicely over time, but when we returned to Slovenia it seemed to become more pronounced and the pain became unbearable. The problem of course is shoes. When I am barefoot [as the Creator made me] or in sandals [to protect myself from broken glass] I had no difficulties, but shoes are the Devil’s tool and it got to the point that even my 25 year old hiking boots that are the most comfortable shoes I have ever owned could not come with in a mile of this foot. My plan was to have the surgery when we returned to Ohio in the spring but going barefoot in the winter, even in a Mediterranean climate, is not a reasonable thing.

I didn’t want to have surgery here because of language. My Slovene is really [and I mean really] not that good that I can discuss carving my foot with someone who doesn’t speak English. I mean, really it is hard enough to get a US doctor to give needed information in a language that I can understand and I think we speak the same language, so the thought of having surgery here when translation was the common language was just too frightening. The second reason was “socialized medicine”. I am a product of my culture that tells me that the US health system is the best, and I have heard all my life how terrible socialized medicine is. And even though I am a fervent believer in free universal health coverage for all American citizens I have been brainwashed to believe that truly the best care for my hurtin’ foot was at home. So it made sense that if I could choose I would have the surgery done in the US, but I was not able to walk!!!! So let me give you the real story of my experience and dispel some of the myths of universal health coverage…..

MYTH #1 YOU CAN’T CHOOSE YOUR OWN DOCTOR – Bob had a terrible cold the first year and took some days off from school, but to get paid when not teaching you must have a doctors statement stating that you should take time off from work [and in our experience doctors are highly preventative and encourage people to stay home and heal rather than work themselves to death]. He asked the secretary at school to recommend a doctor and he went to Dr. Maja Klemenc at the clinic across the street from the school. They had a great conversation in English, she gave him permission to stay home until he regained his voice and he has gone to her again for the same annual beginning of the school year condition. When I needed a doctor I asked the secretary to call the same doctor for me. I got an appointment immediately. At her office I signed a paper that designated that I was choosing her for my doctor and now she is my doctor. The choice was not different than moving to a new town and choosing a doctor by asking a friend for a recommendation, and was actually easier than when we moved to Ashland. When we first moved there, no doctors in town were taking new patients and so we had to drive 30 minutes to another town to find a doctor who was willing to take us.

MYTH #2 YOU HAVE TO WAIT A LONG TIME FOR TREATMENT – Qualifying statement: I admit from the beginning that my situation may be a little different because I am a foreigner and the doctors have become our friends. When I requested the first appointment I wanted to make it for the following week. The nurse in the office recommended that I come that very day [Wednesday] because this was on my foot and she didn’t want me to have more difficulties. Wow!! After the doctor looked at the foot she agreed to consult with our mutual friend and surgeon Dr. Igor Pavlin that same day and I needed to return the next day to see what they had agreed upon. The next day when I stuck my head in her office door she saw me, called me into her personal office, and told me to go on Friday to the hospital to see Igor while he was on duty.

On Friday I went to the hospital, Igor looked at the foot, sent me to x-ray, showed me the x-ray, took out his hospital calendar book and scheduled me for the following Thursday. Just like that!

Before the surgery I needed blood work and an ECG. Monday I went to Maja’s office, she told me to come back to her office on Wednesday morning. Wednesday the nurse [whose English is about as good as my Slovene] took my blood with the most gentle prick I have ever felt, I returned in the afternoon after the blood work was completed!!! and had an ECG in the office. I took all the results with me when I went to the hospital the next day.

MYTH #3 THE QUALITY OF CARE IS POOR - I have never had surgery like this and I take no medication so I can’t compare this experience with too many others, but Bob has had both of his hips replaced and he has spent a lot of time with doctors and in the hospital. I had blood drawn, shots, anesthesia, medication, an incision, and an overnight hospital stay. Every aspect was the most professional. The shots were gentle, the incision is clean and healing beautifully with no infection or swelling, the anesthesiologist offered me three options and together we chose the lighter general so that I did not have to have a tube over my vocal chords or a spinal. I woke up from the surgery with almost no pain, none of the hallucinations I have had with past anesthesia and I have suffered from no post surgery stress. It was recommended that I stay in the hospital over night and if I needed to I could have stayed longer. In addition they did not wake me up every two hours to take my vitals; instead if I was asleep they let me sleep. Plus they sent me home with documents that told me my diagnosis and test results and the procedures that were performed [some of these I can even read]. Compared to the care that Bob received at the “world renowned Cleveland Clinic” after his first hip replacement this was a visit to a health spa. Bob had a leaky catheter that I had to fix myself and clean up the spill because no one would come in response to his call button, each shift of nurses had a different opinion on whether he should wear the pulsing socks to prevent blood clots, his food was placed out of his reach when he was not allowed to get out of bed, his room was not cleaned for the weekend and we got him out of there as fast as we could so that he didn’t contract anything else. His surgery was fabulous, but the hospital care was very

MYTH #4 THE FACILITIES ARE POOR – The biggest difference between this Slovene hospital and US hospitals I have visited or stayed in is that here there are no fountains in the lobby [actually there is no lobby really], there is no original art work on the wall, the building is not new with glass sunroom enclosures, the room did not have a TV, I think there may not be a comfortable chair in the entire building, there is no insipid mood music playing constantly, the hallways are dark and the inside and the outside of the building really could use a new paint job with a designers eye. The food was unpleasant as hospital food is required to be, but this may be the condition of being a vegetarian in a meat eating nation [spaghetti topped with canned peas and corn in a light cheese sauce is even too bizarre for my imagination], but I did have fresh fruit and a fresh green salad. The building looks well worn, and probably needs a lot of renovation [the weather was torrential rain and they had some puddles in the emergency area]. The colors are really unpleasant; the walls are painted a Microsoft Word blue with Post-it-Note yellow or gold trim, and there were three different colors of blue in my room [walls, window trim, window frame, curtains]. Some of the equipment looked older than I have seen in Ohio hospitals, but everything seemed to work. Many of the rooms had 6 beds but I was in a single room [foreigner and not a Slovene speaker]. And I was never required to sit in a wheel chair; because I could walk out of the hospital they allowed me to do so. But none of these things are an indication of the care they are just the façade and even though it was difficult not to judge the care by the packaging I tried to break out of my American perspective.

Language was indeed a difficulty. My doctors both speak beautiful English and were very open to answering my questions and made certain that I understood everything. Unfortunately many of the nursing staff was either without English skills or were too shy to use them so I learned more Slovene and they learned a little more English. It is certainly not their fault that they couldn’t communicate with me and I was frustrated by my weakness, but I have grown so accustomed to most everyone speaking English that I was surprised how difficult it was to communicate. Fortunately I had no medical difficulties so it really wasn’t a problem, but I had people I could have called to translate if needed.

THERE IS NO MYTH ABOUT THE COST!!! My insurance, that I pay nothing for, covers 85% of the medical costs and I could have purchased an additional insurance to cover the additional 15%, but I didn’t know about it and we didn’t purchase it in time to allow for the 3 month waiting period. My first doctors visit cost me €2.20, my antibiotics cost €1.50, my lab tests were really expensive €3.84 and I don’t know yet my out of pocket cost for the hospital, but I am guessing it is a lot less than I would pay in the US. €1.00 = $1.33 UPDATE: 1/8/09 Today I received the bill - Total cost 2.062,18 - my portion 191,78

EXTRA BONUS TO THE SLOVENE SYSTEM – If I had needed to stay in the hospital it would have been encouraged until I was able to go home – if I had needed therapy it is possible that a stay in a health spa would have been prescribed and paid by my insurance - if I was younger maternity leave would be a year and if it was a difficult pregnancy I would have had paid sick leave prior to the birth

According to http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html - 2000 World Health Association Ranking System – the US is ranked 37th in the world in quality of health care – Slovenia is 38th – Costa Rica is 36th and Cuba is 39th – I could not find out what the criteria was for the assessment, but France and Italy are #1 and #2 and the US is 37th? Why do we fervently believe that our health system is superior?

When I return to the US I will sign up for American health insurance that will cost me over $200 per month with a $2,500 deductable, but 100% pay after the deductable. I can not use the US insurance in Slovenia with out paying for everything first out of pocket and Slovene insurance is not honored in the US. But this is a much better deal than the “excellent” State Teacher’s Retirement plan which cost me $400 per month [Bob has his own costs], $1,500 deductable and 80–20% pay. And I am one of the lucky ones because I can afford to pay this outrageous cost so that the insurance companies can throw away my money on CEO salaries and gambling on the stock market, and then beg the government to bail them out for their irresponsible behavior. Guess I get to pay for my insurance twice, but what about my son who can’t afford to pay????

If you haven’t seen Sicko made by Michael Moore you can watch the complete film on youtube and it is worth the 2:03:56 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fANRr6JumJs

Resources:

www.commonwealthfund.org

http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/1862/International-Comparisons-Health-Care-OVERVIEWS-SELECTED-HEALTH-CARE-SYSTEMS.html

2008-11-22T04:12:00.000-08:00

FOR MORE RECENT ENTRIES GO TO www.kayraplenovich.com

Sunny Adriatic

SALT-FLATS

The day had the breath of chill in the air and winter was peaking in the window, but the sun was still claiming the sea so we headed to the salt-pans on the Adriatic. There are two remaining “salt farms” in Slovenia near Portorož/ Piran and in “no man’s land” between the border crossings of Slovenia and Croatia. The salt –pans were the source of salt for centuries and function today as a working museum which produces salt in traditional ways. The sun sparkled on the surface of the stagnant water in the salt-pan squares shooting the reflection with the greater force of salt and called us into the basin of history.

Salt Flats

The first documented discussion of salt making in this area was in 840, but historians believe that long before that time the process of claiming salt from sea water was happening in the delta of the Dragonja River. The richness of this production was claimed by the Venetian empire and sale to the Italians was compulsory until the end of the Venetian rule in 1797, when at that point the Austrian Empire claimed the salt monopoly. In the middle ages the design of checkerboard squares was introduced following the patterns established by Arab salt producers, and in 1358 the petola process was developed to create a carpet of algae, carbonate minerals and gypsum grown on the bottom of the salt plot as a barrier to keep the muddy floor from mixing with the seawater and the salt. Because of this crust the salt harvested her e was known for its purity in color and taste.

Secovlje

The conditions for producing salt were perfect in these protected delta because the climate is hot with a constant warm breeze in the summer and the sea level is relatively constant. Salt was produced in these closed basins by allowing seawater to flow, by gravity or aided by wind or hand pumps, first into a reserve basin and then five basins of different grades of salinity and then to the crystallization and collection basins. As the sea water flowed between the pans the water evaporated gradually, the salt crystals start to form on the surface of the brine (aqua madre), they become saturated and built up clusters of salt on the warmer surface. These clusters were raked with wooden scrapers (gavero) from the shallow pools into piles where, because of gravity, the surplus moisture leaked from the bottom. The dry salt was then gathered by hand and transported by wheelbarrow and wagons to storage units. It takes approximately, 50,000 cubic/m of sea water spread over 100,000 sq/m, of flat solar evaporation area, to produce 1,000 tons of salt a year and this daily collection of salt produced pure white unrefined sea salt. In good years the production was as high at 40,000 tons.

Canal

In 1903 the Austrians consolidated the salt-fields, bought up small producers and modernized the production. After WWI the Italians renovated the fields and enhanced the production to a high level. In 1957 the Yugoslav government built an infrastructure to prevent flooding, but because the mining of salt was more efficient than the evaporation process the sites were closed for production in 1968. The Slovene government has established this area as a protected wetland and a cultural heritage site. Salt is still produced in the traditional ways and sold as a specialty item for eating and beauty care. Areas have also been flooded to encourage greater breeding by sea birds such as the tern and claim this as a wildlife refuge.

Ruins of worker houses

Throughout the 1,400 acre salt-pans remains of the salt houses stand on deserted islands. The evaporation ponds and residences were all connected and separated by canals, gates, dikes and aqueducts. The salt was harvested daily and the flow of the sea water was controlled with the tides, so the workers lived in the midst of their work. Their homes were typically 2 stories with the living quarters on the second floor and storage of salt and tools on the ground floor, with an out side bakery. Now they stand naked with out their roofs and emptied of any sign of life. From the place where we parked the car, I found a recently constructed levee that lead me out to the houses. The mallards reminded me that I was investigating an area not open for tourists, but it was a lonely day and no one else but the egrets noticed.

house construction

The houses, still plumb square, are built of roughly cut pure white blocks of stone from the Istrian Peninsula [the same stone used in the White House] filled with left over chips and mud. There is little land around the houses but each had an area where they docked the boats that would have transported them along the canals. The absolute calm on these little islands was profoundly peaceful., and far on the horizon were the snowy peaks of the Dolomiti mountains, the sound of the sea was quieted by distance and not a single mechanical sound could be heard. It was marvelous!

Peaceful quiet

Sources:

http://www.soline.si/park/?lang=eng

http://salt.org.il/frame_prod.html

http://www.aegean.gr/alas/traditional.htm

http://www2.arnes.si/~kppomm/frames/english/english.htm

http://www.mcvitamins.com/Health%20Opponents/salt.htm

2008-10-28T05:01:00.000-07:00

The Lipizzaner horses live and breed in Slovenia, and have since1580. Estates not far from Trieste were established by Archduke Charles, son of Hapsburg Emperor Ferdinand I for the sole purpose of breeding horses for dressage and parades. Indigenous horses from the Slovenian Kras were cross bred with Neapolitan, Danish, Spanish and Arabic breeds creating the magnificent long bodied brilliantly white horses that are so famous for dancing and prancing. The colts are always born dark brown or gray and have documented lineage for generations. Between their sixth and tenth year the color of their coats lightens and becomes an unblemished satiny white. They are rigorously trained in Piber, Austria and then returned to Slovenia for stud services.
Once a year the stud farm in Lipica has an open house with free tours and exhibits and we took Sarah and Larry Reed visiting from Mt. Vernon, Ohio. It was a gloriously warm colorful fall day and we sat and reveled for two hours in the beauty of the show of dancing and racing Lipizzaner horses.

2008-09-25T02:18:00.000-07:00

"View from Dornberk vineyard"

It is grape season in Primorska [near the sea]. The air is sticky sweet with sun warmed juice, tractors snail from the vineyards hauling loads of grapes and vats of juice, chatting and laughing rises from between the rows and entire families and close friends spend gloriously sweet days picking grapes. Many hands make light work; but it is also a traditional event of working out side, easing the labor of a loved one, socializing while working, gathering around the table outside for a harvest lunch, and enjoying the wine of your labors the rest of the year.

"Spoiled grapes" In some vineyards it was not a good year for grapes. Some of the hillsides had hail the size of eggs destroying much of the crop. Some bunches were full and sweet on the protected side but on the outside bruised and dried like raisins. In addition there was a lot of rain followed by high temperatures. Disease grows rapidly in these conditions and if the grower is not able to spray within an hour of the rain the mold is unstoppable. "Picking in Vogrsko"

Each grower has his own style of picking. Some who have larger vineyards tell us to cut the bunches and not worry about trimming out the dried parts, but others ask us to cut out every bit of the bad and only put the sweetest berries in the bucket [they call the single grape jagoda meaning strawberry]. Trimming every bad spot in the vineyard is a tediously slow process, but makes for lots of time for conversation. "Svetinje"

We traveled this week to Prlekija above the Pannonian plain, in eastern Slovenia on the Hungarian and Croatian borders, to visit the villages and vineyards there. Picking has not really begun yet so the vines were still heavy with grapes. The vineyards look so different because they are tended in different ways. The soil in Primorska is rocky and nothing grows under the terraced vines that follow the contour of the hillside. But in Prlekija the paths between the vines are grass, the vines are trimmed very close to the support wires [maybe to make it easier for machine harvest] and some of the vines run vertical on the hills as well as long twisting ribbons of green. "Jeruzalem"

In Prlekija there seem to be fewer villages on the top of hillsides, but small church communities. We stayed in Jeruzalem [pop. 55] named by the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem who brought the image of the Lamenting Madonna here on their return from a crusade to the Holy Land. The Knights were a Christian organization who built a hospital on the site of the monastery of St. John the Baptist in Jerusalem in1080 to provide care for sick and injured pilgrims to the Holy Land. In 1099 they were charged with defense of the Holy Land, and along with the Knights Templar, were one of the most powerful crusade organizations fighting the Muslims. When the Muslims expelled the Christians from Jerusalem in the 13^th century the Knights were given land on this ridge in Slovenia where the Benedictine brothers built a chapel and church community. The current church was built in the 16^th century. Now the monastery buildings have been converted into a lovely hotel. "View from Jeruzalem" We of course came up with our own fractured history: Richard the Chicken Hearted grudgingly started out for the Holy Land kissing his mama goodbye and promising a souvenir on his return. After a torturous crossing of the Alps and then going up and down, and down and up again and again he decided that the view was pretty good from this hill top so he stopped and called it Jeruzalem. Now he could tell everyone that he made it safely to Jerusalem and sent mama a bottle of Rumeni Muškat for her souvenir. The amazing thing about both stories is the amount of traveling people did hundreds of years ago. We think we are so modern and global and we complain how tired we are from a 12 hour overseas flight. But these people traveled for years and were offered hospitality along the way and were somehow able to communicate along the journey and used trade to pay for everything.

For a country of only 2 million people and a land mass the size of northern Ohio the diversity is incredible. In this region of Prlekija the language does not even sound like Slovene. Our friends tell us that they can’t understand the language here and we certainly didn’t understand anything. In our area everyone speaks English and Italian, but in this area everyone speaks German and probably Hungarian too. We saw homes that had Hungarian influence, stork nests, Austrian castles and regional dishes are made with pumpkin oil and buckwheat. It feels like a different country.

Along our walk from Jeruzalem to Svetinje we followed the sound of the klopotec echoing throughout the valley. The clacking sounds of wood blocks striking wood are used to scare the birds away from the ripening grapes but to us it was the giggling sound of laughter which added even more joy to our adventure. "Klopotec"

2008-08-26T03:50:00.000-07:00

FOR NEW SLOVENIAN ENTRIES GO TO www.kayraplenovich.com

2008-08-02T14:06:00.000-07:00

Kitchen Garden

Vegetable Garden

Sunset

Peace Flags on Front Porch

2008-08-02T13:22:00.000-07:00

I had no idea how it would feel to come “home” to Ohio. I have visited twice in the past two years, but visiting home is like taking a nap on an old bed; it feels right and comfortable, but it is just not long enough to know for sure if your back is going to hurt. Living in Slovenia on the border of Italy is an incredible adventure. Each day we are discovering new places, struggling with language, meeting new people, and wading through the adventure and challenges of two cultures. Some times we are so tired of not understanding, of getting lost, of being continuously confused that we crave familiar normalcy and a place where we can understand every inane thing that is said. But the familiar eases out adventure, and at home we found ourselves searching hard to discover the new and interesting. Would we simply fall into old patterns when we returned? Would the sameness seem dull or comforting? Would the familiar be cozy or uninteresting? Would family and friends be curious about what has changed us, or are we expected to slide back into being the people of the past?

Our home stood breathlessly waiting for us. The trees and bushes lined up for inspection showing how tall they had grown in 3 years; the flower gardens hung their heads in shame because the weeds had invaded and the gardens had lost the war, and the field laughed in wild flower joy. On my first morning at the house I brewed myself a cup of coffee, fluffed milk for a latte and settled in my quiet ritual of rocking on the porch until the coffee is gone. But the hummingbird had other ideas. No one had feed him in 2 years and he was unhappy; buzzing my head on the porch unhappy. So before I could even finish my coffee I had to find the feeder, mix him a cocktail of sugar water and feed him his treat so that I could have a little peace. This same hummingbird has been returning to my feeders for around 6 years I think; but they all look alike. He always comes begging the beginning of May and if I don’t have the feeders out he searches for me. One year I was in my studio on the second floor at the back of the house where there was never a feeder and he found me. He hung at the window fluttering his tiny wings until I got up and filled the feeder, as if to say “Mom, come on I’m home, where’s the food”. He doesn’t search for Bob; he somehow knows that I am the dealer for his sugar habit.

Bob came home the beginning of February and he did an enormous amount of work on the house; keeping it safe during the -17° F temperatures, repairing things, painting rooms to cover renter nicks and finger prints and he planted the vegetable garden with some flowers for me. So I came home to the house that felt like my home. It is delightfully peaceful here. The stream that fills the neighbor’s pond from the artesian well across the street snickers all year long, constantly reminding us that she carries secrets from deep in the earth. The song birds dance in streaks of yellow, red, blue and orange, calling to each other from perches on high and serenading us early in the morning. Bob also moved the hot-tub from the master bathroom to the back patio and where we can celebrate the setting sun from the depth of hot water. Now home seems like a fancy resort with luxury in our back yard. We are so very blessed!

We have found in other visits home that contact with family and friends is very different than we expected. People ask “Do you like living over there?” “Are you home to stay?” When we answer yes to the first question and no to the second the conversation comes to a screeching halt. There seems to be no more interest in what we have done, what we are doing and who we are becoming. The conversation quickly oozes to the local gossip, the quality of playing by the Cleveland Indians, the romantic encounters of music and movie celebrities or diatribes about recent illnesses. Generally people seem to not be curious about what we are doing. That is strange for us because we are so fascinated by the experiences of other people, that we thought people would be fascinated by ours. After sharing stories one friend said “You make me feel like I am doing nothing with my life.” Her comment makes me wonder if that is how our stories make others feel. Rather than feeling interested and excited with us the conversations make them feel badly for themselves. We of course hope that our choices can help inspire others to take the risk and do the things that they have always wanted to do and live life without regret, but it doesn’t seem that way.

This summer has been a garden holiday. We have reestablished some of the flower beds, grown the vegetables for our dinners, and built a wildflower labyrinth. It has been a time of reclaiming the home that we designed and built with our own hands. It has been a time of reading, talking, visiting and sharing. It has been a time of great contentment.

Our plans now are to live in Slovenia for 6 months during the school year and 6 months in Ohio working the land. We both will have part time teaching jobs in Nova Gorica and we will call Šempeter our Slovene home for another year. We hope to return to Ohio in April, reestablish Thistlefink Gardens, sell flowers and take full advantage of both of our homes and all they have to offer.

2008-08-02T12:25:00.000-07:00

Hummingbird friend

Garden Harvest

Red and Black Raspberries picked with friend Carson

2008-06-01T06:48:00.000-07:00

The views from my bike today

2008-05-18T06:38:00.000-07:00

Cliffs of the Vipava Valley

Predmeja meadow

Pot [path]

2008-05-18T06:29:00.000-07:00

2008-05-18T06:18:00.000-07:00

It’s really SPRING in Slovenia!! I know it is spring [or trying to be spring] where you live too, but here spring is oozing out of every pour and the air is sweeter than a candy shop. The sweetness is roses that reach caressing me when I walk by screeching me to a stop, the sweetness is the locust trees hanging their flowers in front of my face along the bike path, the sweetness is the crowns that light up the giant chestnut trees along the street, the sweetness is the cluster of lily of the valley sneaking under the fence begging for attention.

When we first moved to Slovenia in August the air was thick with the smell of roses, lavender and rosemary and I was so distracted by the scent that I had to be careful crossing the street. Now those scents are not as strong to me because they are so familiar, but when spring comes new scents attack me and this year seems to be more intense than the past two years. I never remember being overwhelmed by the smell of the air in Ohio. I’m afraid that we have so many hybrid plants that the roses are perfect and beautiful, but they don’t smell. Lilac bushes are the most glorious scent, but we were given a lilac for our new house that did not smell. I was profoundly disappointed. How can they steal the lilac smell? So I am delighting in the taste of each smell here and planning my walking path to pass by certain gardens and trees.

Last week I had an unusual free day and I went hiking near Predmeja. To get there I have to climb, weave and wind along a long narrow road that has 3 tunnels hand cut out of the rock. At the top, the walking path follows the cliff edge looking into the Vipava valley and dashes in and out of forest, meadow, farm fields and rocky out crops. The profusion of wild flowers was amazing; florescent blues and yellows tucked protected in the grass or near the base of a rock, white clusters spinning in the wind along with the apple blossoms that called to me with the song of the Sirens. The complete peace was interrupted only by the twitter of yellow and grey birds, the warning of a rooster or a farm dog. I could have walked for days, but the wind quickly exchanged cotton candy clouds for charcoal whirlwinds and I escaped just before the rain.

Vipava valley from my picnic spot

path marker

forest floor of blue

glow of the sun at my feet

2008-05-01T04:48:00.000-07:00

Sunny yellow cottages tip-toe through the grass
like dandi-lions dotting the walled pastures.

Slab stone flat pavement glistening in salt spray,
their toes tickled by delicate blossoms, seeds blown from across the wind.

Guinness chocolate foam licking the lips of repeeated melodies
of flute, concertina, guitar
toes tapping, stepping to time.

The language sings to the wind swept bushes
nothing could be greener.

Burren looking to Fanore

Cliffs of Moher

Rocky coast

pasture

2008-05-01T04:35:00.000-07:00

Bob went home to Ohio the end of January because our house was going to be empty during the most bitter cold part of the winter, and we just couldn’t take the risk of damage due to freezing pipes. It’s difficult to be here in Slovenia without him. Not only have we spent 35 years supporting and caring for each other, but after a day of traversing another culture, another language, and many cultural differences, it is a huge comfort to come home to the snugly warmth of his arms. But the thing I have discovered most is that I am pretty boring company for myself!

We decided to have a romantic rendezvous for my May holiday, I kept telling people that I was meeting my American lover . Now I know that no cartographer would believe that Ireland is half way between Slovenia and Ohio, but for us it seemed like the perfect mid point. And they do speak English. Don’t they?

We each flew into Shannon. Bob arrived before me and was all ready with a rental car, a warm loving smile and the comfort of US. We planned to hike a lot, and I wanted to do the entire trip by foot and bus transport, but Bob really wanted to drive on the left side of the road so we had a car [and I am really glad we did]. We had booked a B&B on line outside of Doolin for a couple nights and the rest of the week was up for grabs. Bob did great with the driving!! I just said “left” when we turned corners to be certain that he was not on automatic pilot. The only difficulty he seemed to have was judging exactly where the left side of the car was. The secondary roads are cart paths lined with 5ft. high stone walls and bushes growing on them. He could see the middle of the road just fine, but the side of the road was a mystery. I learned quickly not to hang my arm out the window.

We stayed only on the western coast along the monstrous cliffs to the sea. It is the most amazing countryside. Checkered all over the rolling hills are ancient stone walls used still to corral cows and sheep. The land rolls and rolls along until it falls off the cliffs of Moher into the crashing, smashing sea. And there are no trees!!! Yes I really mean that in some places there really are NO trees. The trees that do stand, jitter-bug all day with the wind and have a distinctive limp. The soil is thin on top of the glaciated rock, the wind is powerful, but we also read that the English cut down all the trees so that the Irish would not gather in the woods. This is just one of countless despicable acts done by the English to keep the Irish in slavery, desperate poverty and as a subservient population to the crown. The lack of trees though provides brilliant vistas to the sea and we could watch the rain storms and the bursts of sun come and go on the currents.

Bed and Breakfast cottages speckle the landscape all along this area brightly painted yellow, salmon or trimmed in shocking blue. Tourism has brought new life and lots of people to this farming community, but the B&B’s are still working farms raising cows for milk and meat as well as sheep and following Irish traditions with warm hospitality and kindness. We booked a couple nights at Moher Lodge on the internet and stayed in the lovely home of Mary and Patsy Considine, but then moved to the Aille River Hostel so that we could cook our own meals. The off season rate for the B&B was 35€ per person plus breakfast, the hostel was half that, but we had a private room and we could cook. One of the fabulous things about the B&B was breakfast; fresh squeezed orange juice, fruit, home made scones and a traditional Irish breakfast for Bob. This breakfast of sausage, bacon, black pudding [blood sausage], potatoes, eggs, grilled tomato washed down with strong tea would be torture for a vegetarian, but I understand for a meat eater it is “The way to start the day”. I had a hard time sitting at the same table with him.

Doolin is advertised at the music capital of Ireland and we decided that the Irish have the same gift of exaggeration as the Slovenes, because it is hard to even describe Doolin as a town let alone a capital. But this title brings people from all over the world to this tiny hamlet, without a grocery store, a bank or an ATM, to hear traditional music. There are lots of places to stay and pubs for music, food and Guinness. After watching the sunset we went every night to O’Connor’s to hear music by a different group nightly. I am pretty sure there were never any locals in the pub, but lots of Americans and French. None the less, to sit all night soaking a dark foamy beer engulfed in fiddle and flute tunes is a taste of heaven.

Bob hiking in the Burren

music at O'Connor's pub

Aille River Hostel, Doolin

trees dancing with the wind

2008-05-01T04:21:00.000-07:00

During the day we hiked. I had hoped to hike from town to town and settle in a new place each night, but the hiking routes described in “Walking Ireland” are really walks on these narrow roads that have a 100km/hr speed limit. What are they thinking?! So we were really thankful for a car.

We drove to the Burren and hiked cow paths, across fields, climbed walls and walked for hours on bare rock polished by the glaciers. This is a karst region just like our area in Slovenia, but nothing at all like it. Karst is a geological phenomenon caused by slightly acidic rain dissolving the limestone surface creating fissures and then forming under ground aquifers. In Slovenia sink holes are very prevalent and the underground water comes to the surface out of holes in the side of the mountain or sneaking under the hill. But in the Burren the fissures are crevices in strips and down inside there are miniature flower gardens protected from the wind and able to collect the rain. Looking into the distance on the path from the Black Head Lighthouse the Burren landscape looks like giant petrified cow pies. It is tricky walking up the hill and over the slices in the ground. Humans have lived and worshiped here from pre-history and forts, tombs, and stone circles still remain. Unfortunately if you don’t know what you are looking for everything looks like rocks piled on top of rocks so everything or nothing looks like an ancient monument. We had a marvelous time wandering; chasing the sunshine and hiding from the rain showers.

Poulnabrone Dolmen [prehistoric tomb]

fissure garden

prehistoric fort on Blackhead point

the Burren

2008-05-01T04:05:00.000-07:00

We also watched a local Gaelic football game. It was played on a plateau over looking the bay and it is a combination of soccer and basket ball. They did not dribble the ball with their feet or their hands, but both. Running down the field at full speed they would bounce the ball on the grass or kick it off their foot back into their hands [did I say they were running full speed down the field being chased and guarded??]. One point can be scored if kicked through the goal post [like Am. football] or 3 points if it is kicked past the goalie into the net [like soccer]. There was very little physical contact between the players, but a lot of running without stopping. I was exhausted just watching!

With the map of the area we also went searching for castles, churches, monasteries and grave yards. There are so many remains of old buildings that cows graze in the living rooms. The map tells of a castle, but the signs are few and far between. It made great adventure turning down rough roads trying to find a place that is pictured in a guide book, but hidden in the mist and only available for the very determined.

In a few towns thatch house can still be found. Many are charming tourist spots, but some are still lived in. It is clear that the Irish economy is doing well by the energy that is used to keep the houses in lovely shape and beautifully cared for.
Everywhere people were warm and friendly and curious. I found it very difficult to wade through the accent, and I found my self speaking more slowly and simply the way I do in Slovenia because I couldn’t understand them. I had to shake myself into remembering that English was our common language [although all the signs are in Gaelic and we heard a lot of Gaelic spoken].

My family immigrated from Donegal, Ireland before the potato famine that devastated the country. 50% of their population immigrated from abject poverty and slavery. On the next trip we will go to Donegal and search the McGarveys.

http://www.doolinireland.net/
http://www.cliffsofmoher-ireland.com/index.html
http://www.esatclear.ie/~ailleriver/

High Cross at Dysert O'Dea

O'Brian's tower

Gaelic football

2008-05-01T03:11:00.000-07:00

thatch house in Adare

makings for thatch

horses have the greatest view

signs in Ballyvaughn

2008-01-29T06:41:00.000-08:00

dining room

Zapreval Tourist Farm

Bob in front of the peč

Slovenia has over 200 tourist farms; working farms where guests are treated like family. http://www.slovenia.info/en/Countryside.htm?podezelje_1=0&lng=2

When Bob and I visited Slovenia the first time in the fall of 2004 we stayed in 4 different tourist farms in different parts of the country. Each experience was unique. There was one we wouldn’t recommend because we needed to put a chair against the door to keep it from swinging open at night, the people seemed to argue about everything, a light in the bedroom was dangerously hanging from a wire and Bob had to bend backwards in half to keep from hitting his head when using the toilet. Another was just an apartment in someone’s modern house and it was not on a farm or had any of the charm we came to expect. But we have a favorite that we have visited often since and can highly recommend.

http://www.slovenia.info/en/farm-with-accommodations/Tourist-farm-Žgajnar.htm?farm_with_accommodations=162&lng=2

Zapreval is a small village high above Ljubljana and not far from the medieval village of Škofja Loka. From the Žgajnar tourist farm you can see the lights of Brnik Airport if there is no fog, but there is no sound of planes. There are only a few farms in Zapreval but it sits in the middle of Stari Vrh ski resort so day and night time skiing takes place all around the village. In the months when there is no snow people hike and the very strong and determined ride bikes. We have been there in all seasons except summer and it is the most perfectly peaceful place at all times of the year.

Jana greats each guest with a warm smile and šnops made from flowers, blueberries, or maybe even honey before she shows you to your room. I keep trying to drink this horrible liquid that makes me shiver with every sip just to see why it is so celebrated, but so far I can't recommend it. At the farm there are basic accommodations for as many as 20 people, and most of the rooms easily sleep 3. Each room has a private bath and an incredible site viewed from the tiny old windows to the mountains, the valley, the ski slope or the gardens.

Meals are served in the common dining room with the peč. My favorite seat is leaning up against the tiled stove and keeping my back warm. A peč was a common part of every home. The hearth was in the kitchen and served as a cook stove and oven for baking, but the channels of hot air blew through a maze of ceramic tiles that stuck out into the room next to the kitchen and served to heat the house. Children slept on top of it in the cold winter, and on racks hanging from the ceiling clothes were hung for drying. This family farm is generations old and they still raise cows, fruit and vegetables that are served at table. We stayed here the first time in September and Bob went with Jana to the woods hunting for mushrooms that were then served in the most tasty mushroom soup [gobova juha] imaginable. The food is homemade daily and she is very sensitive to vegetarians. Mostly it is a place of great aesthetic beauty in a natural farm sense and we feel very cared for and welcome.

Off season the cost for a room, breakfast and dinner is less than 20 € per person per night.

We have visited Zapreval 3 times this school year. Once in the fall, when Aaron and Elle were here after Christmas and then late winter just before Bob returned to the U.S. Sadly the snow was not so good this year and even though they make snow and have beautiful new ski equipment and buildings the skiing is only marvelous if the snow is great. We did do some skiing and it was such fun, but we were never there when all the slopes were open. But that didn’t matter, because it is really fun to be there on top of the world, in the quiet of the early morning, when the fog is still settled in the valley and the sun is melting the ice off the trees. It is truly a piece of heaven.

2008-01-29T06:00:00.000-08:00

2008-01-13T09:20:00.000-08:00

Cheers!

Bob and Kay

Aaron and Elle dancing

Tenors

Bob and I have been married for 35 years. Impossible, since I still feel 35, yet true!

We celebrated our anniversary while Aaron and Elle were visiting us in Slovenia and in good Slovene tradition we had a party. A great party!! We rented the beautiful cozy banquet hall at a tourist farm in Tabor and invited 50 friends from our schools and the choir at Sveta Gora and Bob’s family from Podlipa. As is traditional the evening began with pršut, bread, cheese and šnops (and grilled vegetables for the vegetarians). Then we all sat down for dinner of pork, chicken, sausage, potatoes, vegetables (and pasta for the vegetarians) served with homemade wine from Joško and Alida. Next came the buffet of salads followed by American desserts made by us(chocolate chip cookies, brownies, peanut butter cookies, toffee bars). We hired a button box accordian player to provide music for singing and dancing, and much was done all night long.

It was the greatest joy for us to celebrate our union with our new friends. They have become so meaningful to us and they celebrated our friendship by singing songs for us, writing new words to old songs to applaud our longevity and even the teacher's choir sang “When I’m 64”.

It was an unforgettable evening of lots and lots of laughter with dear friends and family.

2007-12-22T08:07:00.000-08:00

Crossing from Italy to Slovenia

Slovene border

Fireworks

Costumed Italians

One of my friends said, “I can’t believe that the border is down. There have been border crossings for my entire life. It just seems impossible!”

The borders between Slovenia and Italy and Austria were officially opened on 21 December when Slovenia became apart of the Schengen border-free area. At one minute past midnight lights were lit by Slovene and Italian officials together on both sides of the border, bands played, costumed citizens danced and fireworks lit the night sky. We stood on the bike path on the old railroad track that had served as the border between the two countries since 1947 and watched the celebrations on both sides. After the official opening and dismantling of the crossing gates, masses of people walked freely between the two countries, for the first time, without document checks.

This border was more than simply the line dividing two nations, but it also was the division between people of the same culture. Gorizia, Italy was once a city of Slovene majority. After WWI the city of Gorizia and the region of Primorska were annexed to Italy and the Italians began to bring citizens from other parts of the country to Gorizia for work and to increase the Italian population. After WWII Primorska was returned to the Slovenes [at the time Yugoslavia], but Gorizia remained Italian. Nova Gorica [new Gorizia] was birthed from a field of roses so that the Slovenes could live in Slovenia and not have to live any longer under the ruling of the Italians. Some people could not leave their families, their businesses, their farms, their houses and had to stay in Italy. The border separated them from family and friends and even some farmers had vineyards in Goriška Brda, Slovenia and Colli Orientali del Friuli, Italy straddling both countries.
One friend tells of hearing the bells tolling for the death of his grandmother in Italy, but none of his family was allowed to cross the border to attend the funeral. Another tells of smuggling meat across the border with her mother, as a young girl, in hopes of earning some money by selling it to Slovenes in Italy. And a popular story is a day when the border was opened without stipulation and people went in mass to visit family and friends in Italy, each returning with a broom slung over his/her shoulder; a commodity more precious than gold.

Prior to 21st December everyone had to show documents when passing to the other country and there were certain borders for locals and borders for all others. Because we do not have EU passports we could only pass at the international crossings even if we were walking or riding our bikes. Now because of the free borders we can cross into Italy just 2 blocks from our apartment.
This celebration was the biggest Schengen opening and creates a 24-country area where EU citizens can travel without passports. In addition to Slovenia , Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic also joined the Schengen.

To stand and watch the excitement and feel the energy of breaking down barriers was a thrill. Although our friends here have experienced other moments in history it is seldom that I have been able to feel the breath of change hot on the back of my neck.

2007-11-30T07:33:00.000-08:00

Croatian Coast
Trogir from the church tower

2007-11-30T07:31:00.000-08:00

Holidays are one of the many nice things about working in the schools in Slovenija. There is a week holiday for each season, and this gives us the opportunity to travel and discover more distant places. This fall holiday, at the end of October and beginning of November, we decided to drive down the coast of Croatia as far as Dubrovnik enjoying the coastal road along the sea and stopping at the ancient villages along the way. The Dalmatian coast is dotted with islands, some inhabited, some naked of trees and life, so the view along the coastal road is interesting and varied.

There were Indo-European settlements along the Adriatic as long ago as 1200 BC and the people were known as Illyrians. The Celts followed much later in the 4th century BC but were defeated along with the Illyrians by the Romans in the 2nd century BC in an attempt to protect their ships from attacks from the Dalmatian coast. The Romans built great roads, thriving walled port cities with community buildings, amphitheatres, grand palaces and aqueducts to transport water. The Roman Empire in this area was destroyed by relentless attacks by the Huns, Vandals, Visigoths and Longobards. In the 6th century the Avars conquered the land and the Slavs, Byzantines, Croats [a Slavic people possibly from Iran], Franks and Hungarians followed. Croatia was not united until 1058, but the land was still fair game for the Hungarians [again], Tartars, Turks [many times], Venetians, and in the 1500’s the Hapsburgs from Austria, then Napoleon, then Austrians again until the dissolution of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire as the result if WWI. In 1918 the Croats joined the Slovenes and Serbs in forming the State of Slovenes Croats and Serbs, but many of the cities along the coast were annexed to Italy and the country remained divided. During WWII the country was invaded by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy and resistance to these forces resulted in the creation of the Partisan movement and eventually the Communist Party under the leadership of Tito [of Croatian, Slovene mix] and the formation of the country of Yugoslavia. In1991 Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia [a day before the Slovenes] and a devastating war between neighbors broke out between the Serbian factions and the Croatian nationalists. 1995 peace was declared, but UN forces monitored the land until 1998. Now Croatia is in negotiations for acceptance into the European Union, but there are nationalist who are afraid that joining will not be the best for Croatia, so the conversation continues. But with this history it is no wonder that Croatian people want to be autonomous without the dictates from elsewhere.
When we travel all day in our 1995 Twingo along a road originally built by the Romans, past medieval villages, we are flabbergasted by the amount of traveling done by foot, on horse back, and bumping along in wagons. Modern humans think that we are so mobile with the easy access to airplanes, trains and cars, but in ancient times they traveled unbelievable distances in conditions we would think were less than desirable. Men must have been away from home for years fighting in far distant exotic places while women were home tending the homestead and family. My romantic image of the homey peasant farm, multiple generations snuggled around a blazing hearth after a day of hard work is distorted by the realizations that they had great fear of invasions, the loss of the man of the house for years and what strength the old people and women needed to survive.

Bob visited Dalmatia in 1972 with his parents. His memory is desolate hillsides divided into plots by stone fences and small isolated villages clustered in bays where a port for trade and fishing was possible. 35 years of progressive modernism has drastically altered the landscape. Now the hills that rise directly from the depth of the sea are scared by tourist apartments and hotels. The Croatian tourist board advertises Croatia as “The Adriatic the way it used to be”, but there is little of the pristine beauty Bob remembered to be found along the road. The 2 lane road hugs the hills side and I can’t even imagine how awful it would be to travel the twist and turns in the height of tourist season. All these apartments must be filled with people from somewhere and the only way to get there is by car. The road must be impossibly impassable. The high hills still are divided by stone walls, but no longer do sheep graze or vegetables grow. Certainly the standard of living is much higher and people earn their living during the summer giving them the winter months to recoup and rebuild. No longer do they need to fish the sea daily or trudge the high slopes to raise food to survive, but I wonder what else within their lives and culture is lost. I know that I am the worst kind of tourist. I want to visit the “old country” and see people living the simple life; instead what we see is entrepreneurship at its best. People add multiple stories with private rooms to their homes; they advertise with a soba/camera/zimmer/ room sign and rent them out to people passing by. We made no reservations, but waited until after dark and found a sign lit up and knocked on the door. In each case we were warmly welcomed, given a clean room with a private bath and comfort for the night.

The main cities we visited were Šibenik, Trogir, Salona Dubrovnik and Cavtat. All have been beautifully restored. The pedestrian areas and buildings are made from quarried Dalmatian stone, arches cover the sidewalks connecting the buildings, stairs polished from generations of feet lead to gardens and city walls. Small shops serving residents and tourists peak out from under layers of ancient stone, some clearly stolen from Roman structures. Benches are placed under palm trees and churches appear around every corner. The colbalt sea is ever present by sight, smell or the taste of salt in the air.

I really liked Salona, a Roman community near Split, named after the salt that was harvested there. The foundations of an ampitheatre, temples, baths, homes, walls, gates and roads remain. One man, Frane Bulić, spent much of his life as and archeologist uncovering this city that once was the richest and most populatedRoman city in the mid-Adriatic area. It is easy to see the shapesof the city and in the late afternoon and feel the ghosts of residents who wore grooves in the stone road under the main gate into town. The sophistication of the Roman infrastructure is fascinating. An aquaduct brought water up from the river to the city and covered trenches to displace gray water are still visible . I thrill in walking the path of the ancients. Most of the paving stones have been used for other purposes in other places, so grass carpets the roads and sidewalks giving the place the sense of peacefulness. Yet along the river are oil storage tanks and the modern buildings of Split loom in the distance, but for a moment I can imagine what it must have been like when it was a thriving community.

Dubrovnik was our main destination. To get there we needed to travel inland past the Neretva river delta. This swampy area has ancient raised walled beds for growing that can only be reached by boat. The sweetest tangerines I have ever tasted hang heavy on the trees and stands sell them along the road by the kilo. We ate them like candy with juice dripping everywhere. The approach to Dubrovnik is a dramatic breathtaking view from the hillside. Goats peered down at us when we stopped to look at the city jutting out into the sea. The shape of the walled city makes it clear why this was a safe fortress for centuries. It became the independent Republic of Ragusa in 1382 and the wealth of the inhabitants and the power of the sailing fleet made it a force to rival Venice. A devistating earthquake destroyed the center and the buildings we visited are those rebuilt in 1667. The exterior walls were massive protection from Turkish invasions, but they did not protect the city from the bombing of the Yugoslav army from autumn 1991 to May 1992. From the hillside over 2,000 bombs and guided missiles rained down on the city disturbing half of the houses and all the monuments. UNESCO, the European Union and private sources funded the rapid reconstruction of the city beginning in 1995. As we walked along the streets looking up at the rich design of the buildings it is difficult to imagine the poison that would cause people to destroy such an ancient treasure, but then the expertise, the hard work, the creativity that restored the city shows the goodness in humans that I hope will balance the hatred. We were very happy to be in the city off season to wander around in a slow stroll absorbing the ambiance of the empty streets. We stayed in a B&B just outside the walls and when the second day was pouring rain we had a lovely place to snuggle up and watch the storm come in waves from the sea.

We took an over night ferry from Dubrovnik to Rijeka on the way home. The weather was gray and the wet windy road would have been a tough drive. It was much nicer to sit in the lounge next to the window and watch the coast line pass us by. We met an American couple from Texas and it was really nice to just sit and talk over drinks and dinner. People here speak beautiful English, but it is very relaxing to speak English with people that share a common culture. We can use phrases, make references that are understood by all and it was a delight.
When I visited Bari, Italy with the teachers the first year we were walking through the middle of the old city and there in front of us were Roman ruins. I was slowly dragging at the back of the group looking at every little detail while the rest of my friends rushed by. I stopped at the Roman columns and said “Wait are these Roman?” One teacher stopped and said, “Yes I think so”. “But you just rush by!” I said incredulously. “It’s just more old things”, she said “we see old things all the time.” I will never tire of visiting the ancient sites of this area, but it is amazing how one medieval village begins to look like another after a while. I can’t even believe I am saying that!!

2007-11-30T07:26:00.001-08:00

Neretva river basin
Solona Roman ruins
Split seen from Solona

2007-11-30T07:24:00.000-08:00

Dubrovnik

2007-11-30T07:01:00.000-08:00

Ferry ride

2007-11-13T21:34:00.000-08:00

Go to youtube to see a beautiful ad for Slovenija.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPYx0JniVGM&eurl=http://erikobid.blogspot.com/2007/10/slovenia-home-sweet-home.html

2007-11-03T06:49:00.000-07:00

Autumn in Slovenija

Autumn is beautiful this year in Primorska. The leaves seem to have more color than in the past couple of years and the florescent gold against the sea blue sky draws us deeper and deeper into the mountains. Higher in the hills there are fewer maroon/brown oak trees and more beech forests; yellow laced in brown. The iceberg white boulders rise up from the moss covered forest floor lit by this tent of yellow. Mushrooms of all colors, healthy and poisonous, abound along the path while the prickly shells of the chestnuts and the crunchy beech nuts prevent us from walking silently along the path. The elves know we are there, and it is the perfect hiding place for them to peak at us as we hike past.

As always we are shocked by the rugged terrain and the insanity of fighting war amongst these natural obstacles. Both world wars damaged the heart and soul of this land. The Partisans practiced their guerilla warfare against the Nazis and the Italian fascists only 30 years after WWI devastated everything in its path. They retaliated from deep in the mountains of Primorska and reclaimed much of the territory populated by Slovenes that had been captured by the Italians. The stories are horrific on both sides.

The Italians were cruel masters in this conquered land after WW I. People were only allowed to speak Italian, Slovene was not taught in the schools, some sir names were changed to Italian, people were sent far from their families to work or as a punishment and the towns were called by the new Italian name rather than the name of history. Impoverished southern Italians were brought to Gorizia to populate the area laying claim to the land for Italy.

Partisan popularity was great in this area and support for the Slavic home guard who would free them from their oppression. During WWII the Nazis also claimed the territory and their retaliation for the killing of German soldiers included butchering the men, burning the towns and sending the women and children away. The village of Lokve [45 minutes from our home] was burned twice by the Germans leaving the people in the depth of winter without shelter or food.

It must have been heartbreakingly difficult for the Slovenes to choose their loyalties. The Fascists were foreigners who had taken their country by force ruling with great cruelty. The Nazis were forcing themselves on all the countries around with reports of greater atrocities. The Partisans were locals fighting underground to reclaim the land for the original inhabitants, but they were aligned with the communists and people had fears for the future of their country and their religion. The church did not condone the opposition to the Germans and the Italians, yet these were the enemy by all definitions. Because the communists were aligned with the allies there were few resources for fighting communism, so the domobranci resisted the Partisans and were armed and fed by the Germans. All the political choices had negative consequences and depending on the outcome of the war and the mind set of the victor, ones choice could provide either freedom or death.

Unfortunately after the war was over the killings did not stop. In 1945 tens of thousands who had resisted the Partisans and aligned themselves with the Germans fled the country. Many went to Argentina, Australia and the United States, but others attempted to flee to Austria. At the border after traversing the Julian Alps on foot, in horse drawn carts or piled into trucks the British army turned them back. They were told that the Allies were going to take them to safety to Italy, but instead they returned them to the victorious Partisans under the leadership of Tito. These Slovenes [men, women and children], along with Croatian Ustaše, Serbian Četniks, Croatian civilians and soldiers from the Italian and German armies were seen as traitors to the homeland and hundreds of thousands were brutally beaten, murdered and dumped into mass graves. Some of them were war criminals, but others were civilians who were assassinated without a trial. The locations of the graves and the stories that accompany them have been hidden for generations and are just now being discovered. In 1999 while building a road along the Austrian border near Maribor a mass grave was discovered in the Tezno forest. The remains of over 1,000 people were found in an anti-tank ditch that had been hidden for 60 years.
Near the village of Lokve there is a sink hole that was the sight of mass graves of Slovenes and Italians following the war. The area is identified as a cemetery, although there are no graves marked, and a massive chime with a deeply resonating tone is the monument to those who were massacred.

Primorska is celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Partisan movement this fall with events, speeches, parades, singing and remembering. The town of Nova Gorica, built as a new town in the new country of Jugoslavija by the new leaders from the Partisan movement, had a giant celebration. The organization TIGR [Trieste, Istria, Gorizia and Rijeka], wishing to reclaim all these Slovene areas to their rightful inhabitants, remains a presence. The old men stood at attention with their flags, their caps, their memories. After the festivities with good jota in their bellies and a glass of wine in their hand they gathered in groups all over town to reminisce through stories and songs.

I watch all the events. I see their faces, the glow of pride, the memories of what it was like to be involved in changing the face of Europe forever and I wonder how many stories have gone untold and are best to remain hidden.

2007-11-03T06:45:00.000-07:00

Partisan 60th anniversary celebration

Lokve [village burned by the Germans]

Area of sink hole mass grave near Lokve

2007-11-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

Faces of the Partisans

2007-08-22T09:59:00.000-07:00

WWI military road

Isonso Front

Kanal on the Soča River, destroyed in WWI

2007-08-22T09:45:00.001-07:00

WWI bunker

WWI litter - cans and tins

Modrejce military cemetary 2,750 soldiers buried in 550 graves

I am magnetically drawn to WWI battlegrounds. They pull me despite the resistance of my pacifist heart. I have no idea why the hillsides, where blood watered the soil, have an inexplicable fascination to me. I am attracted to the art, architecture, clothing and music of the time around the turn of the 20th century, but why places of war?

WWI lives here in the conscious of the people. The war was horrendous, and all around this area there are daily reminders of the horror. Soldier cemeteries, the grass cut and graves aged but not abused in any way, showing the 90-year-old respect for the dead even if he was an enemy.

There are many places where litter of war can still be found on the hillsides. Along our hikes are foundations of stone buildings smothered with moss, walking paths that were once military roads, and sometimes rusted metal plates, tin cans, or other mysterious metal objects are found lying where dropped 9 decades ago. There is surprising peace. The energy is not one of absolute despair, but of acceptance that the sacrifice was not in vane. The ground is carpeted with creeping myrtle, ivy or long arched feathery grass as if someone planted ground cover to hide the memory. 90-year-old trees tower above, shading the forest floor preventing choking undergrowth and scrub bushes. Fresh blood pink cyclamen dribble at the edge of the paths beside pure white rocks that jut from the ground as uncut memorials for those who have fallen. And it is silent. Only a few bird motifs, but no rustlings of ground squirrels or mice break the white noise of the Soča River below. A place where I can sit in absolute complete stillness.

WWI began at the end of the colonization of the world. Places were spoken for and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Italy and Germany found themselves without colonies to compare to Great Britian, France and Russia. Europe was divided in two; Austria and Germany with great interest in the Balkans and Russia, England and France giving support to the Balkans to keep the Germanic influence at bay. When Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the Austrian hier to the throne, was shot by a Bosnian revolutionary youth in Sarajevo 28 June, 1914 the tensions could no longer be kept under control and the world exploded. War broke out in the late summer of1914 with the Austian ultimatum to Serbia, the German declaration of war on Russia and France, and the British declaration of war on Germany. Italy promised neutrality in 1914, but when Britan and France promised Italy, if victorious, the territories of Tyrol, the city of Trieste [Trst] the provinces of Gorizia [Gorica] and Gradisca [Gradiška], the basin of Tarvisio [Trbiž], part of the Duchy of Carniola extending the watershed, the Istrian peninsula, some o f the Croatian islands and a share of territories in Asia Minor and Africa, they saw hope for expansion and declared war on the Austro-Hungarian Empire 23 May 1915. The United States joined the war in 1917 and after the death of 10 million youth it was finally ended 11 November, 1918. Insanity had become governmental policy.

The mountainous border between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy is the land of the Slovenes where war dominated their world for 29 months. All equipment had to be hauled by men, mules or dogs up switch back roads newly cut into the face of the mountains. Kitchens, milking parlors, butcheries, hospitals, tanneries, laundries, gardens, barracks, and stables were built of local stone. All that the soldiers needed had to be brought by foot, or made in army villages of huts clinging to mountains sides. All supplies brought up the mountain were made from metal; canteens, digging tools, lanterns, repair tools, cooking supplies, guns, coffee mills, cannons, cheese graters, steel beams, generators, explosives, lights. Water collected from rain and snow was stored in wooden barrels and left to fester in hot weather. Men were dressed in heavy wool uniforms, their legs wrapped in layers against rain, snow and ice, cleats were attached to the bottom of their boots with leather straps for traction on ice and snow. Wool capes covered their shoulders and nothing dried once it was wet.

1916 was the worse winter of the century and millions of men were stranded high in the mountains in snow over a meter deep. Tunnels were dug as protective trenches in the snow, like igloos. The soldiers hid themselves in arched snow caves with windows for shooting the enemy and dodging icicles caused by the heat of their bodies. ''It was so cold that fifty men from the entire battalion had to descend from the mountain due to frozen feet... I stayed in a trench for 24 hours, crouching among dead bodies, ours and those of the enemy. The stink was unbearable, and to tip it all, we had to resist a fierce attack by the enemy, which we repelled. A lot of our comrades died because they were hit in the head when they rose over the bulwark to shoot... The rations were scarce, consisting mainly of bread, cold boiled meat of lean taste! Water is brought in skins; it is very scarce and stinking ''( from diary of Virgilio Bonamore 2 August 1915 on Mt. Batognica from display in the Kobarid WWI Museum.) ''The trenches were an unfathomable maze of headquarters, food deposities and arsenals, first-aid posts, kitchens, artillery bases and emplacements for other weapons, deep shelters, loop holes, enlarged sites from which grenades were launched, observation posts etc.; in them there centred the life and the warfare, the sleep and the rest, the death the sorrows and sufferings as well as the modest joys of the soldiers existance.'' (Svoljšak, Petra; The Front on Soča; Ljubljana: Cankarjeva založba, 2002) “My heart breaks at the sight of these men in the prime of their youth who were mangled by shells, and many will perish for the sacred and rightful cause about which most of them have not the slightest idea.” (Gregorio Soldani 2 November, 1915.)

I spent over 2 weeks this summer in the Kobarid area where 11 offensives in the Soča [Isonso] River Valley were fought. Now the roads and paths tread by the soldiers are the trails of vacationing hikers. Trenches, bunkers, observation points and buildings are attractions of the historically curious. Kobarid has a wonderful small museum, not colored with national politics, that tells the story of the lives of the young men. The museum walls are cluttered with photos of everyday life on the mountain slopes and other events worth documenting. Post cards that had been printed and sent showing the devistation of towns tell the tales of the locals trying to survive in the midst of chaos. Ancient church records were destroyed with the churches and the towns that housed them, so the birth and death history of families was lost forever and when the war was finished the people had to rebuild their lives from the rubble of a world gone mad. The town of Šempeter, where we live, was flattened and all the buildings where we shop and drink coffee were rebuilt from the remains. Sveta Gora where I sing every Sunday was devistated because of it's strategic location on top of the mountain, but was rebuilt by the Italians in the original style. The presence of the power to survive, the will to carry on is evident in the buildings we see every day.

2007-08-22T09:01:00.000-07:00

WWI trenches and stairs to and from trench

Charnel House 7,014 Italian soldiers buried here

WWI military road now hiking trail

2007-08-03T03:41:00.000-07:00

Jelly fish

Šežana coast

Coast near Umag

Piran

2007-08-03T03:30:00.000-07:00

In the Sea
Veli Ločinj
Senj

2007-08-03T03:28:00.000-07:00

By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea,
You and I, you and I, oh how happy we’ll be…

This summer I am spending some extended time on the Croatian coast along the Adriatic Sea. Within an hour we can drive by car to Croatia. If we time it just right and take the back roads we avoid the crush of traffic escaping the heat and the long lines at the border. The Croatians seem to resist welcoming the most common visitors from Italy, Slovenia, Austria, Germany and even as far as the Netherlands by making the summer tourist queue into one line to pass through the border. It almost seems as though they are saying, “What are you doing? Why don’t you just stay at home?” It is a forced cultural lesson. No one at the crossing gates is in a hurry. They seem to insist that we all start behaving like good Mediterranean residents and live life at a calmer pace. The roads are single lanes leading to and from the border, and the only travelers who are able to go quickly to the coast are the motorcycles that squeeze down the solid line between cars where there is dangerously not enough room. The car travelers must form a slow train to their holiday spot and there is no point in becoming anxious.

All along the Croatian coast, villages that were once supported by fishing or grazing animals are now swarming with tourists from all over the world. Hotels, resorts and summer homes of bright colors rest along side stone walls that once kept sheep from wandering. Medieval villages birth kitschy tourist shops selling things made from shells from every stone doorway. Captains of fishing boats are now tour guides to the islands and beaches. Single-family homes are being built to include rooms to rent or apartments in neighborhoods where each house posts a sign “Soba, Camera, Zimmer, Rooms” The tourist season is six months and the rest of the year is preparation for the tourists.

The economy appears to be thriving, but the attitude projected by the wait-staff in cafés and restaurants demonstrates the love hate relationship found in so many tourist areas. When I worked in Estes Park, Colorado we hated to see the tourists come. They were demanding, disrespectful, rude and often unpleasant. They were there to have a good time without concern for those who provide services. The students in Amish country in Holmes County, OH used to call the gawking aging bus tours “terrorists”. Yet like these places in the US, undoubtedly the life on the Croatian coast would be too quieter with out the tourists, and no one would have enough work to be able to live there. The tourists come for peace, relaxation, old charm, water and sun, but after dark the sound of disco throbs in the air, the beaches are packed with people, the old villages are decorated with flashing neon lights, the sea is being over fished and too much sun gives you skin cancer. Maybe tourism is not as good as it seems. I wonder if these villages will be deserted like Route 66, once the fickle tourist industry chooses a “new hot” spot; leaving deserted hotels and resorts.

In our part of Slovenia the world runs down to a halting pace in July and August. Shops and restaurants close down for the holidays, the library has shortened hours and even the health clinic in our neighborhood is closed. The streets are quiet and the pace is slow to accommodate the heat. Everyone I know goes to the sea. They take the 20-minute drive to Sistiana for an evening swim or they find a favorite spot on the Croatian coast and return year after year with friends and family spending all day in the water and roasting in the sun. The sent of fresh grilled fish, bought from the door to door fish monger, seasoned with sprigs of rosemary plucked from the yard, and smoked with fresh bay leaves cut from the hedge, peppers the air. Children play after-dark games while parents chat over a glass of wine. The world is relaxed. The Croatian coast resonates summer pleasures.

The coast was bare until after the war; no houses, no hotels, only fishing villages. Like Primorska, Italians following WWI, occupied the Istrian peninsula. Slovenes who were willing to change their names and speak only Italian were relocated here to work the land. They all seemed to have lived comfortably along side the Croatians and most signs are still written in Croatian and Italian. After WWII this coast belonged to Jugoslavia and many Slovenes bought small parcels of land for seaside cottages. Made by hand of Istrian stone, the houses were modest get away places that provided leisure, known before only to the aristocracy. Now, blurring historical class distinctions, the 20th century workers were provided holidays as their rights along with jobs, education and health care and they too spent the summer at the seaside.

Nothing grew on the cliffs over looking the sea. All building materials, and plantings had to be brought from elsewhere. Families spent every weekend creating by hand summer retreats to be enjoyed for generations. Originally there was no electricity or water supplied; cisterns were built under the houses for collecting rainwater and the glow of oil lamps lit the houses after dark. Concrete docks used mostly for sunbathing were built in the middle of the night during a full moon. Bags of cement were hauled down the cliff along with fresh water for mixing. When the tide was at its lowest the men stirred from sleep and poured cement in already constructed frames until the sea water returned to the shore. The docks are more like concrete platforms of varied heights jutting along the bottom of the cliffs, some have stairs into the water, metal cups for inserting umbrellas, others have cement seats formed for sun bathing and platforms for diving. There are no signs of private property or barriers to keep people from the houses further up the hill from enjoying the sea, it seems to be public land for all to share. The cottages are close together, but made private with 50-year-old pine trees and towering hedges. Now in the time of abundance, modest cottages are being replaced by enormous elaborate all season homes or rental apartments.

The sun is so beastly hot that I go swimming just to cool down. Never have I experienced anything so marvelous! The sea temperature is 25° [77°] and with the heat index of 41° [105°] the experience was amazingly refreshing. I have been swimming in salt water in Maine where it is too cold to stay long in the water, in Florida and Georgia where the waves are too strong to do anything but play, and in Oregon where I was certain I would get frost bite from putting my big toe in the water. But this water was luscious and so amazingly salty. It is difficult to swim because the sea seems to throw me out. I am so buoyant that instead of cutting through the water with my front crawl I bounce across the surface skimming like skipping stones. But to float is like lying in bed stretched out on top, toes pointed, legs spread, paddling with fin shaped hands lying for hours on top of the water. The density of the saline solution causes me to want to curl in a fetal position, slow down my breathing and revert to prenatal quiet. But all around are tanned little bottoms gallop along the shore in and out of the water wearing floating devices and clutching beach balls. Topless moms are sunning all possible bosom styles and grandmas wear the same bikini from the “itsy bitsy teeny-weeny” years, but to less affect.

I can stand erect in the water, arms hanging at my side, feet flat as if solid with only my head above the surface. The breaststroke seems impossible because the frog kick raises me up arching my back and throwing my feet out of the water. It is easier to walk in the water using the breaststroke with my hands but an upright walking motion with my feet. Swimming is not strenuous; it’s like walking on water. The quiet of the sea makes it possible to defy gravity.

I had fish tanks as a child, and now I think if I ever settle down in just one place again I will get a cat to snuggle on my lap, a dog to play Frisbee in the yard and an aquarium filled with fish of magnificent colors to watch swim around and around. I put on a snorkel mask and below me is a mystery. I am trying to not use trite overused phrases to describe things, but there is no other way to say that below the surface of the water is another world. A social structure is created by the diamond shaped shimmering schools of fish, crabs crawling over each other, sea cucumbers that must have inspired Jaba the Hut from Star Wars, and zillions of things camouflaged from me. Large stones litter the sea floor, blocks and pillars that I imagine are Roman are decorated with mollusks, mustard gold sponges. Only the fear that my back would get too burned in the sun pulls me from the vision of wonder in the sea.

My imagination that the pillars could be Roman is possible. The Istrian peninsula like all of this area was settled during the Roman Empire, but the sea rubble could be from the marauders who followed the Romans; the Goths, the Lombards, the Frankish kingdom [789], the dukes of Carinthia, Merano, Bavaria, the patriach of Aquileia, the Republic of Venice [1267], Napoleon, Austrian Empire, Italians, Nazis, Jugoslavs or simply rubble from the massive amounts of modern construction. I prefer to think that an ancient roman constuction crew littered a rejected stone and it has been home to sea creatures for centuries.

2007-08-03T03:16:00.000-07:00

Piran, Slovenija from Croatia
Novigrad Sunset

2007-05-28T05:06:00.000-07:00

The teachers at Bob’s school take an annual spring educational holiday. Last year I went with them to Southern Italy, this year Bob and I both went with 35 other teachers and family members to Istanbul.

We left Wednesday evening with 2 holiday gift days from the school and returned on Sunday. We flew from Ljubljana at midnight with the Turkish truck drivers who load their trucks on tanker ships in Koper, Slovenija and then fly 2 hours to Istanbul to await their cargo. Once in Turkey the ride from the airport to Taksim square in the middle of the night gave us an unobstructed view of the city lit for the night; the Bosphorus river, the mosques and minarets, ancient walls of Constantinople and people gathering for kebabs and roasted chicken in the darkness. At first sight it was surprising the number of people casually wandering the streets in the early morning with the unexpected atmosphere of calm and safety linked by sweet smells.

Istanbul, known as Byzantium and then as Constantinople, is now a city of over 10 million people. Because of earthquakes the older buildings of the city are not tall, but they are crowded in together and piled on top of each other. The city has one foot in Europe and one in Asia spanning across the Bosphorus river that links the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara and has been the seat of trade for thousands of years. Artifacts date settlements in this area from 5,500 BC and the history includes anyone who was anyone in the world [Ancient Greeks, Alexander the Great, Romans, Goths, Constantine, first church council at Nicaea, Theodosis I [same one who battled in the Vipava Valley in Slovenija], Justinian, missionaries from Byzantium to Slavic nations, Normans, Venetians, Turkic nomads, crusaders, Seljuk Turks, more pillaging crusaders, Ottoman Turks, countless Sultans, Sultanate women, more Sultans, Austrians, French and British soldiers and Greek forces]. Because of the influence of Mustafa Kemal Paşa [better known as Atäturk, “Father of the Turks”] Turkish land was reclaimed by the Turks, the sultanate was abolished in 1922, the country became a secular republic, the Arabic alphabet was replaced with the Roman alphabet, western dress was encouraged and all Turks were required to claim a surname. The red flag tells the story of the moon and one star reflected in the bloodshed of wounded Turkish soldiers fighting for independence. These are people proud of Turkey; proud of being Turkish and with every greeting they warmly welcomed us to their country.

Modern Istanbul a blend of new buildings, ancient remains, towering mosques, quaint cafés, crowds of people and stores, stores, and more stores. Little hidden stores the size of my bathroom, men with carts, men with card tables in the middle of the street, stores in basements, stores on side walks, stores in every nook and cranny and that is without even discussing the bazaars. It is obvious the Istanbul has been, and continues to be the mecca of trade, and buying and selling is a high art with rich social contact.

2007-05-28T05:00:00.000-07:00

The bazaars are unbelievable!! [attached photo] Every arch hides a shop, wares tumble into the street, the colors are vibrant sparkling with brilliance, the air tastes sweet, tangy, hot and spicy, the salesmen call to you trying to guess your language mesmerizing you with friendly infectious charm and shoppers stumble over themselves, each other, the impromptu shop set up in the middle of the sidewalk, and the men carrying goods on their back or pushing wheeled carts. The entrepreneurial spirit has been tradition and culture in the Grand Bazaar since the 1450’s and the Spice Bazaar since the 1600’s. Everything is sold here; there is such abundance that the sheer number of goods in one place is overwhelming. Bargaining is expected and even fun.

We were pulled into a rug shop [“Madame I am proud of my carpets, and I want to show you, with no obligation to buy…. of course.”] and spent the most charming couple of hours with the owner learning about rugs, drinking apple tea and Turkish coffee. We went into the lower level of the shop and there were carpets and kilims everywhere; new carpets, semi old [50 years] and antique. [photo attached]There were 3 carpet rollers who flicked open the carpets at our feet showing us ones made from silk, camel hair, wool, natural dyed, synthetic dyed, tribal designs, floral patterns and each one identified by the area in which it was hand made. Kilims are tapestries that have geometric designs and are woven with a warp and weft rather than knotted like a carpet. The colors can vary greatly within the kilim because of the natural dye and the technique of weaving. Often their original purpose was not to be used as a carpet, but as a bag for carrying things. Because they were designed for use rather than decoration the exactness of symmetry is not important and they have a primitive look that I like very much. Now they are sold as floor or wall coverings and we are the happy owners of one with colors of green olives, red currants, golden wheat, camel brown, white sand, and sunshine.

2007-05-28T04:59:00.000-07:00

We visited a number of mosques including Haghia Sophia [attached photo], which was originally an Orthodox church, and then a mosque and now a museum. This church, dedicated in 537 [yes that is correct five hundred and thirty seven], stands on the site of 2 other churches that were destroyed by fire and earthquake. The Ottomans added minarets, tombs and fountains in the 15th century when it became a mosque, walls were supported with buttresses to keep the immense dome intact and many decorative changes have altered the face of the building over the centuries. Glorious Christian mosaics still remain in the second floor galleries [attached photo], and some of the patterns in the ceilings and along the walls are original 6th century decorations.

The Blue Mosque has a much different feeling than Haghia Sophia. It is called such because of the İznik blue tile that covers the interior [photo attached]. This active mosque was built in the early 1600’s and its delicate interior beauty is in stark contrast to the bulbous gray exterior. The Rüstem Paşa Mosque is also an amazing collection of tiles and designs [photo attached]. There are no images of people in any of the mosques only patterns and natural designs. They are very soothing places open without charge to visitors at times when prayer is not taking place. The decorations are so much more peaceful to me than the images of martyrs and Christ hanging on a cross in painful death that we see in the European Catholic churches. The voice from the minarets calls the faithful to prayer, crowds of people slowly wander to a mosque, the men cleanse themselves at faucets provided along the wall before entering the mosque [photo attached], the women come with heads covered and long dresses covered by a floor length coat or a burka, all remove their shoes and the Moslem city prays. The rest of the city continues the hubbub of daily life and doesn’t even seem to slow down while prayers are being said.

2007-05-28T04:56:00.000-07:00

Blue Mosque

2007-05-28T04:48:00.000-07:00

Rustem Pasa Mosque
Ablutions faucets

2007-05-28T04:38:00.000-07:00

Not far from the Hippodrome hidden from view is the Basilica Cistern [photo attached]. It is an amazing store of water from the 532 AD. After the occupation of the city by the Ottomans [in the 1500’s] people collected water and fished for food through holes in their basement floors keeping the cistern a secret for over a century. Now visitors can walk through the cistern looking at the fish, listening to soothing music and marveling at the construction of something so long ago.

We also visited Topkapi palace showing all the treasures of the Sultans in the museum, Galata Tower where we could see the entire city [photo attached] and İstiklâl Caddesi the pedestrian street [photo attached] crowded with people moving like an ant colony with purpose, but no rush or hurry. I was most fascinated watching the people. Beautiful dark hair, dark skin, dark eyes and every other blend of looks, women in full black covering with only their eyes showing and women in skimpy nothings with everything showing, men finding ways to earn money by shining shoes, carrying bread on their heads and bags on their backs and selling everything imaginable. I expected beeping horns, loud shouts and a dirty huge city, but the language is soft so even with so many people in one place the city is quiet, people do not seem to be in a hurry and the streets are clean, lined with vibrant tulips. It was not at all what I expected, we felt safe and welcomed, and we both look forward to the next visit and the discovery of so much more.

2007-05-28T04:22:00.000-07:00

2007-05-28T03:31:00.000-07:00

2007-05-03T13:33:00.000-07:00

The killing of 33 people at Virginia Tech. University last week has my classes discussing how a mass killing like this could possibly happen. In each class at least one student says that this could only happen in the U.S., and that leads me to try to explain why it is possible in the U. S.

From the founding of our country we were given permission to “bear arms” so that we could protect ourselves in war with the British and the Native people. The fear of having a standing army like countries on the European continent convinced the writers of the constitution that the people must create a civilian army if needed, and for that, weapons were necessary. The mind set from the very beginning was to provide us with the means of protection from the enemy, whom ever that may be.

The enemy is not only a force from outside our nation, but the enemy is the “bad guy” who lives in our community and may want to cause us harm. We are given permission to protect ourselves, our families and our belongings, from those with the intent to rob us of that which we consider precious. The permission to protect ourselves creates a fear that forces us to pass laws that allow us to carry concealed weapons, and gives us invitation to use fire arms indiscriminately, in rage or when frightened and against those whom we should be protecting.

The National Rife Association repeatedly reminds us that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” and guns are not the problem. But we do not kill with knives and we all have multiple weapons nestled in the top kitchen drawer. If one is intent on protecting oneself, or committing a heinous crime it is much more difficult with a kitchen knife. That is a crime of intimacy. One must come close to the victim, make physical contact, eye contact and feel the heat of the other person’s body. The opportunity of a physical struggle is greater and the risk of personal harm is drastically enhanced. A gun is anonymous; a weapon can be engaged from a far distance or relatively close range. The shooter does not need to have contact with the victim, a massive number of bullets can be shot in a short amount of time and the personal risk to the protagonist is limited. Guns are the problem!! If we only had kitchen knives or red Swiss Army knives, killing sprees would be a rare occurrence.

Yet the problem is not only the access to weapons, but also a culture of violence. After WWII we marketed violence as entertainment; war movies, cowboy and Indian movies and television programs. The sight of Native savages and Nazi soldiers falling in massive numbers was the pabulum of the baby boomers. When that became tame the next generation enhanced the graphic depiction and added it to nightly news, prime time television, and popular music. And now we are exporting it to the entire world. The dulling of our sensitivities when we see someone die in the media is supported by a government who spends $.41 of every tax dollar on the military and only $.05 for education. Our priorities are obviously the support of violence. We spend 48% of the military spending in the world and the $415 billion price tag on the war in Iraq confirms that violence is very big business.

All of these things explain why an intelligent yet disturbed19 year old college student was able to kill himself along with 32 of his peers and professors. He immigrated to a country that gave him permission to purchase handguns without psychological testing, classes in gun safety or belonging to a registered hunting club and made his killing rampage possible.

The pattern of this discussion makes me ashamed of the United States. It makes it difficult to explain to my students that I am a normal American [nice, friendly, caring, intelligent]. It confuses them when I tell them that I am not afraid to live in the U.S. I do not fear for my life on the streets of Ohio and I do not lock the doors on my house or my car. People are friendly and hard working they care about their families and the rate of charitable giving shows how much they care for other people. Opportunities abound and creative energy is celebrated as we discover new ways to make the world a healthier easier place to live. Yet millions of our citizens do not have health care, 2million of our citizens [the population of Slovenija] are behind bars, the largest number of prisoners anywhere in the world, we kill criminals with the death penalty, we go to war under false pretenses, our children can buy guns before they are old enough to buy wine and almost 30,000 of our citizens are killed with hand guns each year.

It is hard for me to help my students understand all this, because I do not understand any of it myself.

2007-03-06T03:24:00.001-08:00

Primrose
Zafran [wild crocus]

Spring has arrived in Slovenia. In the shade the air hints of a damp cold refrigerator, but the sun is so toasty that we shed layers searching for bare skin to sizzle in the sunrays. Each day more trees are blooming and soon the wild cherry tree out side our balcony will be exploding in white. The magnolia trees are giant pink ruffles next to the florescent feathery mimosa blossoms with crocuses underneath. Pansies and daffodils tilt their faces to the sunshine and shimmer in glowing light in the breeze.

Panovec is a wooded area close to the center of Nova Gorica. It has paths and dirt roads throughout the woods for hiking. In the lowlands wild crocuses speckle the grass between the toes of the trees where the fairies have left pink, purple, and white flowers. The snowdrops nod their bonnets, primroses clutch the earth on the southern slopes and white flowers that look like an anemones peak out of the carpet of leaves. The kos with it’s ink black body and orange beak sings arias from the tops of the trees while the little birds that look like a blend of chickadee and goldfinch add a pop tune closer to the ground.

The farmers have come alive too. The clear plastic protecting the salad crops is coming off, piles of manure delivered from the dairy farms in the high lands mark the ends of the gardens and the tractors are digging deep into the earth trading warm soil for the cool damp dirt. Small old tractors serve as modern horses pulling the hand led plow guided by a person walking behind.

It is also time to trim the vines. All over the steep hillsides people are working on the terraced land cutting the old growth so there will be grapes to harvest this year. The techniques of trimming are different with each grower; one vine from the trunk with 10-12 eyes curled and tied down or 2 vines with 10-12 eyes but not tied down, or the 3-3-3 system we were using in Joško’s vineyard; 3 short vines with only 3 eyes each, plus 3 nubs with only one eye as growth for the next year. Last year I was only willing to serve as the puller of the old vines for fear that I would trim something wrong. This year I boldly learned to see the growth of the vine, discern the old and unhealthy vines to be cut away revealing the strongest and healthiest left to nurture the 2007 grape crop. The hillsides are still with concentration with the occasional sound of a chain saw cutting posts for new plantings, and the slow dripping of the tears from the vines of the new cuttings.

The vineyards twist around the hillsides and everyone knows which section belongs to whom. Some of the current property boundaries were established by Archduchess Maria Theresia [1717-1780] of Austria, Holy Roman Empress and Queen of Hungary and Bohemia in the 1750’s. She brought unity to the Hapsburg monarchy and reform for the serfs living on the land in the empire. The serfs under feudalism leased specific land from a landowner, and the family passed from generation to generation the requirement to work this land in exchange for protection and care in time of famine. The understanding during this time of Enlightened Absolutism was that the strength of the monarchy was no longer determined by the size of the army and the amount of land, but by the health, well-being and productivity of the people. Maria Theresia imposed strict restrictions as to the treatment of the peasants by the landlords, and established that the work dues paid by the serfs become rent to inspire greater efficiency in the workers. The serfs had their own land of open fields for production, wood lots for fuel and building materials, and uplands for grazing the animals. These feudal lands have been inherited for generations and the style of farming small strips of land continues to this day.

2007-03-01T01:57:00.000-08:00

Sempeter
Kurenti
Ptuji parade

2007-03-01T01:46:00.000-08:00

Budapest
Funicular looking at Pest
Fishermen's Bastion
St. Matyas Church

2007-03-01T01:45:00.000-08:00

Winter holiday from school arrives just as the kurent are scaring away the winter in their furry costumes with bells ringing around their waists. Children and their parents dress in costumes and parade around town throwing confetti for the pust celebration and carnival is in the air. In our town of Šempeter, the downtown area is closed on Saturday before Lent and the participants and the viewers gather under a sunny sky near the inflatable decorations and tents. The odd combination of balloons, krafa [a jelly filled donut sprinkled with powdered sugar], cotton candy, popcorn and beer are sold on the streets as people gather just to be out and about and together.

The parade consists of a marching band, costumed walkers, social commentary banners [that we can not understand] and a reproduction trolley built by the firemen at the firehouse across the street from us. Every night for weeks we could hear the pounding, the music playing loudly, the struggle to take tires off an old car as the volunteers had way too much fun building a workable trolley that held people dressed in historic dress.

We attend the biggest Slovenian pust celebration, Kurentovanje, in Ptuji on the Sunday before Lent. Thousands of people migrate to this river town and line the streets watching for the 400 international kurenti weaving through the medieval village in a 2-hour parade. The kurent are furry creatures made of sheepskin with horns, long red tongues that hang to their chests, cowbells hanging from their waists and headgear decorated with colorful streamers and horse tail. Traditionally the kurent paraded from house to house bouncing up and down ringing the bells to scare away evil and winter. They carry large pinchers used for catching girls and courting gestures were disguised within the general frivolity. The parade was begun in Ptuji, the oldest city in Slovenija, in 1939 to protect the traditions unique to this area. This year kurenti came from many Balkan countries that share the same ancient traditions. Parking was free, very few vendors were hawking wares and all the shops were closed, as is tradition on Sunday. It was refreshing to see that the motivation of the event is to provide a community experience and not to use it only to make more money.

Following the parade in Eastern Slovenija we head further east and north to Budapest. This is the first time we have been to Hungary [Magyar Köztásaság] and the trip across the border is like traveling into another world. The villages are made up of houses built along the edge of the road. The front wall facing the street is only the size of a wall with 2 windows and commonly single story, but the house continues long and perpendicular to the street connected to the barn and other out buildings. The streets are without curbs and a gate often closes the entrances into the yard. The grayness of the day and the dirt from the winter contributed to the sense of regimented desolateness in the fringed structures along the road.

New highways are being built to connect the capital cities of the EU countries and where the superhighway was finished we were often the only car on the road. It is an eerie feeling to be so alone on a beautiful state of the art road as if it was built in the hope that people will want to travel there.

Buda and Pest are marvelous cities separated by the Danube River and linked as one by majestic bridges. The Royal Palace, St. Mátyás church, the Liberation monument look down to the plains of Pest from the castle district. A funicular takes us up along the ridge where we walk among history beginning with the Celts from around 400BC. Other visitors have been Romans in AD 100, Attila the Hun, the Goths, the Longobards, the Avars, the Magyars [who arrived from the Ural mountains around 896], the Turks, Hapsburgs, the Germans, the Russians and the Communists. Labyrinths below the castle district have been places of refuge from vicious invaders since prehistory and now are mysterious channels of caves designed to inspire visitors to seek a mystical journey. Pest proudly displays a highly ornamented Parliament building, pedestrian streets with fashionable shops, courtyards, towering ornate buildings, museums, opera houses, universities and a luscious giant closed market.

We spend our 2 days walking all over both of the cities gawking at the mosaic decorations, the ceramic roof tiles, the giant sculptures holding up the buildings, the columns, turrets, domes. Riding the old tram around the city was better than any amusement park ride and we are convinced that we are the only people who ever pay for public transportation in this part of Europe, since no one ever comes to validate our ticket. The city is very people friendly, clean and quiet. The language is soft with out a harsh resonance and even in places with large crowds the sounds are gentle. Hungarian is not an indo-European language and is closer to Estonian and Finnish than the Germanic or Balkan languages. Fortunately everyone spoke English so that we did not have to decipher Kozöponti Vásárcsarnok as the Central Market. [We are having a hard enough time learning Slovene; we simply could not tackle Hungarian for 2 days.] The food is marvelous and not expensive. We are eating gourmet meals with excellent regional wines at every restaurant, and snacking on the local specialty lángos [deep fried bread with various toppings] and luscious sweets from the market.

On our way out of town and heading to Graz, Austria we stop for a picnic at Szobor Park where all the enormous statues from the Communist years have been moved. Cubist style statues of Marx and Engels guard one side of the entrance with Lenin on the other. 41Communist monuments live in this walled garden, many celebrating the Hungarian worker, heroes of the 1919 revolution lead by Béla Kun and the soldiers who fought the wars. The park is far out of town; the only statue outside of the walls is the remaining boots of a gigantic statue that was destroyed during the liberation, and it sets the tone that this period in history is not to be remembered or celebrated, but rather hidden and forgotten.

It was interesting to see the differences in topography on our way to Austria. The Slovene countryside is divided into small farm plots that are distinguished by a variety of crops. Villages speckle the landscape with church steeples stretching to the sky and it seems that those who work the fields live near by. But in Hungary the fields are enormous, planted in a single crop of vibrant green winter wheat or earth waiting for the new crop. For as far as we can see there are no buildings of any kind; no barns, houses, out buildings, only cultivated fields.

Our third day is spent in Graz, Austria. Many of my singer friends have traveled to Graz to study singing at the American Institute of Musical Studies. Everyone had beautiful things to say about the city so it seemed like a good choice on this trip to check it off the list of “places to see.” Graz is the second largest city in Austria and the core of the city is a park near the river. We walked in the early morning mist up the castle hill to the only thing remaining when the castle was destroyed by Napoleon. From the clock tower the moisture rising from the river and the sun warming the winter chill blanketed the city in a shroud of mist and hushed the stirring residents as they began their day.

We only had the early morning to spend in Graz, but Bob bought a beautiful corduroy Tyrolean sport coat in a shop along the river that sold only clothes in the traditional styles. He looks pretty gorgeous! Our time was cut short because we needed to meet nephew Matthew coming by train to Villach, but Graz is a city we would like to visit again with more time.

We are so enjoying having visitors. We delight in sharing all the wonderful places hidden to most tourists that are just as stunning as the well-traveled sites. Slovenija is struggling with identity in many areas and tourism seems to have them really confused. They know that tourism is good business for a small centrally located country with great natural sites and many sporting activities, but the infrastructure does not quite reach the potential yet. There is talk of building more casinos, an amusement park, as well as a man-made island in the Adriatic Sea to bring in tourists with “deep pockets”. We hate to see the tourism money spent on things that can be found in other places when there is such uniqueness in the tourist farms, the local traditions and the passion for nature. Unfortunately those who are looking for a quiet get-away may not spend enough money to be considered important and the world seems to be looking for holidays where people are searching for a holiday week to feel like they are among the “rich and famous.”

2007-03-01T01:33:00.000-08:00

Graz
Julian Alps
Hungarian sign
Szobor Park statues

2006-12-16T05:14:00.000-08:00

Decorated for Christmas

Living room

Kitchen

The golden glow from the street light just below our bedroom window clicks off each morning as the sun peaks over the mountains. Sometimes both of those things coincide with the ringing of the church bells at 7:00 and the crowing of the neighborhood rooster to tell us in multiple ways that the day has begun. Our apartment is one of 5 flats on the 1st floor of a new building across the street from the fire station. We think of the apartment as being on the second floor, but the Slovenes had animals and work areas on the ground level so the first floor of their home is what we call the second floor. Some newer homes still have the garage and work areas on the ground level and a full flight of stairs up to the house. There seems to be no concern for building single story homes to keep from climbing stairs, as one gets older, like in the U.S. Our apartment is 3 years old and we are the first tenants. We live in extreme luxury with 2 bedrooms, 1 ½ baths a brand new kitchen with a dishwasher and a balcony off the living room. Our friend Breda owns the apartment and beautifully furnished it for us with all that we need including dishes, bedding and cleaning utensils.

If the weather is nice we ride our bikes 20 minutes to Nova Gorica along the bike path in the shadow of the snow capped mountains in the distance and the castle in Italy. Many people use this path to stroll pushing baby buggies, weave in and out on roller blades, and the ever-present older men wearing hats saunter with their hands clasped behind their backs. This winter has been unusually rainy and foggy [so they say], so on those days we catch the free bus from Šempeter to Nova Gorica, and within 15 minutes we can be at school without the hassle of finding a parking space or wasting energy to drive to town. The buses have been free since April in an attempt to encourage people to use public transportation. In the early morning and after school the buses run every half hour, and the rest of the day they are available every hour until 7:30. Early in the morning we stand crowded jostling along side our sleepy students. The music playing on the bus radio is often Slovene songs mixed with classic American oldies, but depending on the driver sometimes we travel to the sounds of Mozart.

When I arrive early for school I often stop at a café for a cappuccino and join the rest of the community in the delight of good coffee. Apparently because we live on the border with Italy we have better coffee than the rest of the country and a cappuccino only costs about a $1.00. Coffee is the excuse for gathering with friends. Seldom do I see people sitting alone enjoying their frothy brew and never is anyone working on their laptop and filling every waking moment with work.

I am teaching only 8 classes per week in collaboration with English teachers at the Technical high school. The students are almost exclusively boys majoring in vocational mechanics, computer technology, electrical engineering, energy management and woodworking. Some of the students have English skills comparable to my pathetic Slovene [my key phrase is “Moja slovensčina je slaba” = my Slovene is bad], but many of the boys have excellent use of the language due to watching American movies and using the internet. The best use of my role, as native speaker, is to engage the students in conversation applying their knowledge in actual usage. Generally the teachers give me a topic to discuss or grammar usage that follows their curriculum and after researching on the internet [hallelujah for the internet!] we talk about it. I try to apply the topic to their lives and challenge them to higher-level cognitive thinking and many have the skills to have very meaningful conversations. Unfortunately I don’t think their textbook inspires much in-depth thinking so I try to make the discussions stimulating as well as appropriate for their skill level. The difficulty in this is that I do not see the classes regularly enough to know what their skills are, how they have been taught or what they have been taught. So I go into each class with a hope and a prayer that the class I have planned is not too difficult for them, that they will find it interesting enough to want to discuss it with me, and that it meets the guidelines that the teachers are responsible for. As in all schools some teachers have great discipline in their classes and the students treat them with respect while others seem to tolerate more rude behavior than I am comfortable with. I strongly believe that students will rise to the expectations of the teacher if they are clearly and consistently demonstrated. But if the teacher just “wants” the students to behave and is inconsistent in the management of the classroom, the nature of teenagers will turn the class into the opportunity to do the least amount of work possible. In some classes I have been focusing on creative writing, which is also difficult because these are classes of males who have chosen technical fields and who sit in left-brain classes all day. Their creative right brain is very sluggish and many struggle desperately for imaginative ideas, so my challenge is to inspire them to want to do the opposite of what comes naturally for them and in a foreign language. Not an easy task, but many are rising to the challenge and some of the writing has become very creative and fascinating. I really am enjoying the variety of each day and I adore the teachers I am working with. They have been so generous with their classes and make me feel as if I am an important part of their program.

In addition to teaching at the Technical school I am also directing 3 choirs at the Gimnazia where Bob teaches. The teacher’s choir and the American choir were started last year and a women’s choir of students studying nursing was added this year. All the choirs sing in English and the teachers have encouraged the students to join for the pleasure of singing as well as an additional way to improve their English. For the Christmas holidays I took the student choirs to the resident developmental home and the nursing home where they entertained the residents with American holiday songs and Slovene carols. The American Choir also sang for the opening of the local 3-par golf course [who opens a golf course in December?] and for the entire student body and teachers at the end of the year convocation. I am so very blessed to work with fabulous kids who are really enjoying the opportunity to sing as a part of their school experience. Unfortunately the ARTS are very peripheral in these schools because students who are talented and focused in the ARTS attend subject specific schools [the music school is in Ljubljana], so there is little opportunity in the academic or technical schools for things beyond that focus.

I am also teaching some voice lessons for some of my choir singers, but also lessons for advanced singers who have completed the 6-year curriculum at the music school. It seems that it is impossible to take casual lessons at the music school without the entire program that includes theory and piano. These women have completed this program, but there is no venue for their continued study. Fortunately I am able to teach in a classroom at my school and I am very really thrilled to work with these very fine singers and young mothers, who are wonderfully trained and very anxious to learn more. In addition to the teaching I continue to sing in the choir at the Sveta Gora basilica and socialize with the other choir members after rehearsal and Sunday mass. These people have become wonderful friends and a great support system for us both.

I also tutor 2 young boys and a 13-year-old girl in their conversational English and meet weekly with an English conversation group of adults who are interested in improving their language skills and socialize in English. No wonder I am having a difficult time learning Slovene, all my work is in English, and of course Bob and I speak English at home, and except for a few occasions to greet a neighbor, buy something at the store I do not use much Slovene. I continue to try to learn because many of my choir friends do not speak English and I would like to have a more meaningful relationship with them in their language. So I continue trying, but my progress is depressingly slow.

On the weekends we are busy attending the many concerts in the area, celebrations of special days for our friends and traveling to discover more new and beautiful sights. There is so much to do that we sometimes have a difficult time deciding. On Tuesday afternoons and Saturdays we try to go somewhere in Slovenija or Italy and we have seen amazingly gorgeous places just a short drive from our home. The winter this year has been unseasonably warm which has made it good for hiking, but not good for skiing. We have followed many mountain paths enjoying the clear mountain air and the discovery of extreme natural beauty. The real advantage of this area is that within less than an hour’s drive we can be swimming in the Adriatic Sea, hiking in the Julian Alps, bike riding on the karst or wandering through historic villages in four countries, and we can be speaking Italian, Croatian, German or Slovenian, or trying to. The variety of choices is thrilling and makes us want to spend every free moment discovering something new. I think we could live here for a lifetime and not see all the area has to offer.

2006-11-12T03:18:00.000-08:00

Sveti Martin celebration in Smartno
Dobrovo Castle

Sveti Martin Day [Martinovanje] is celebrated on 11 November. This is the day that St. Martin turns the juice of the grapes into wine and the wine season begins. St. Martin was born in Pannonia, Italy in 316. He begged to be able to join the Christian church at age 10, chose to live as a hermit at age 12 but was conscripted into the Roman army at age 15 because his father was a veteran. He chose to take only one servant with him during his military service and continued to live a life of simplicity sharing everything equally with this servant. While serving as a soldier he saw a cold naked beggar at the gates of the city of Amiens in Gaul and he divided his cloak in half and covered the man. Later in a vision he saw Christ wrapped in his cloak and believed that he had cared for Christ with this act of kindness. Throughout the rest of his life he preached the gospel in the central and western parts of Gaul. He eventually became the Bishop of Tours where he continued to live the life of a hermit. He died around 397 and his feast day is 11 November. I could find no information as to why he is credited with the miracle of wine except that his feast day falls at the time when the wine is ready to be drunk.

To celebrate the feast day Joško lines up the wines from the different vats. Each has its unique sunny golden color, some are still a little cloudy but others are clearing up and look like wine. The flavors have evolved over the past 6 weeks from a sweet dense juice, to a slightly bitter taste lacking any sweetness, to a tangy bland flavor, to an almost tasteless liquid with the hint of wine, to a gentle wine bouquet and then finally to the warm flavor that perfectly reflects the sunny day that the grapes were picked. Each choir member tastes each wine and then by consensus “Kay’s Wine”, that was flavored by my bleeding finger, is chosen as the choir’s wine and will be drunk after practice every Wednesday.

On the evening of the Sveti Martin feast day we go with friends to Šmartno v Brdih to taste the wines of Goriška Brda. This village of 250 population teeters on the spine of a hill surrounded by protection walls that were built in the 16th century. The village was built on Roman ruins and the four watchtowers and gates remain. The streets follow the contour of the hill lined with ancient houses surrounding the church of St. Martin with its tower dating from the 14th century. First floor rooms that once served as stables for animals and storage for equipment now are crowded with people savoring the crop of the region. We buy a glass in a pocket that hangs around our neck at the Kulturna hiša [culture house] and wander from building to building sampling the fare. Pršt, “chestnuts roasting on an open fire” and homemade bread are served along side the wines grown at the feet of this village. For entertainment choirs perform in various locations, a polka band gets the blood pumping, the dancers swinging and museum buildings are open showing the style of living in old Brda. The streets are dimly lit so the glow from inside the houses is inviting and nostalgic. Life would have been difficult in this windy hilltop village, but I hope that they had community fun like this many times during their year.

There is indication that wine has been grown in Goriška Brda [gorica means small wooded hillsides, brda means hill] since before the Romans, and continuously from the 12th century. In ancient times the Catholic Church owned most of the vineyards. In 1880 a plaque infected the vineyards and by 1900 half of the vines in Slovenija had been attacked by aphids. Before the plague 126,000 acres in Slovenija were planted in vines, but the plaque bankrupted many wine growers forcing thousands to leave the area and immigrate to other lands. Pre-WWII records indicate that only 94,000 acres of vineyards remained in Slovenija. Prior to the entrance into the European Union barren hillsides were once again planted in vines to creep under the restrictive agriculture rules imposed by the EU. The jury is still out as to whether Slovenian wines will be able to survive in competition with the large vineyards of France, Germany and Italy.

In Brda the soil is mostly shale and sandstone and looks like it would have no nutrients for growing anything. The hills are terraced and grass is grown between the vines to prevent erosion. The climate is considered Mediterranean although it is not contiguous to the sea, but the annual rainfall is high and summers are moderately hot. This past summer was a very dry year and the grapes were sweet, but not as abundant.

Taken from www.matkurja.com
“Of all the Slovene winegrowing areas, Goriska Brda has had the highest "per hectare yield" of medals and awards from wine fairs and exhibitions in the last two decades. The characteristic white wines of the area are gentle, harmonious, fresh, and lively; they generally age well. The best-known white wines of the area are the dry Briski Tokaj (a variety of Toccai Friulano), with its characteristic almond taste and subtle flowery fragrances; the polite Beli Pinot; the strong Sauvignon with its harmony of aromas; dry Chardonnay which reaches its peak with barrique treatment; Sivi Pinot with its long tradition, known on the Italian side as Pinot Grigio; and Malvazija. Perhaps the most characteristic wine of the area is Zlata ("Golden") Rebula. The best red wines of this sub-area are Cabernet Frank, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Merlot - wines with rich and strong pigments that age particularly well - and Modri Pinot, a particularly elegant wine with its stressed extract.
The best known blended wine of the area is the white Brisko vino, a dry white blend of Rebula and Tokaj. The Brici - the Slovene term for inhabitants of Brda - produce and store most of their wine at the Dobrovo winery, the largest production cellar in Slovenia. The Dobrovo cellar also boasts the largest local wine archive that regularly stores some 300,000 bottles of their best vintages. Zlata Rebulais is the most precious wine in store; most of the older bottles are Merlot and Tokaj. This is the only archive in Slovenia that regularly ages Tokaj and offers the best example of how much this wine can improve with age."

I am beginning to distinguish the flavors of Slovene wine, but because so much of what we drink is a blend of grapes I am not always able to distinguish the kind of grape. I particularly like the local Rebula and every once and while I am served a Muškat I like a lot. At the wine bar in Gorizia, Italy the server is always bringing me new reds to taste from the Friulian vineyards and they suit me more than the reds in Slovenija. My friend Jack Keegan has been plying me with wines for years telling me the history that goes with each bottle. I am finally beginning to appreciate the magic and the stories in each glass.

2006-11-03T11:42:00.000-08:00

Žumberak, Croatia

Stojdraga

Interior church at Stojdraga

Exterior of church at Stojdraga

For the fall holiday we choose to go south to Croatia for a week. We have crossed the border to the coastal towns and spent some time on the island of Mali Lošin, but this will be the first time going into the interior. Because of the tragedies of the war in the ‘90’s Bob has been hesitant to go to the places where neighbor killed neighbor and modern weapons were used to fight resentments held for centuries, but I want to see the villages that grandma and grandpa Rapljenović left a hundred years ago.

The weather is gorgeously cool and clear and the vistas along the way force us to either say over and over again “look at that!” or humble us into silence. Slovenija is truly the most glorious place. As we travel southeast the towns began to change in appearance; the steeples thin out pointing more sharply to heaven, fewer houses are clustered in the villages and the valleys nestle under the quilt of farming. We stop at Otočec Castle across the road from a modern [1960’s] hotel where Bob stayed when he was here in 1968 with grandma Leskovec. It is wonderful hearing him recall the memories of being here, playing the drums with the polka band and dancing the night away. That trip shaped his life like no other single event has and our experience here is bringing to life his 18-year-old dream of living in Slovenija.

Stojdraga, the birth home of Nicolas Rapljenovič hangs on the edge in Žumberak, Croatia over looking Slovenija to the north and Zagreb to the south. Signs near the church tell us that the town recently celebrated its 475th birthday. The church was built in 1530 and the community of old wooden houses and new stucco houses sit at the feet of the cross teetering on the spine of this ridge. The cemetery behind the church is carpeted with Obitelji [family]Rapljenović graves. Never before have we seen so many with the name Rapljenović in one place. We are shocked by how little we know about grandpa. Are some of these graves his brothers and sisters? We don’t even know how many siblings he had or who they were. We really know almost nothing about his life here. Neither he nor grandma wanted to talk about “the old country”; I think it was too painful. They left because life was impossible, no work, no hope for the future and great hardship. Everyday grandpa saw vistas far into the northern valley where he could see for miles and places he had never visited, then in the other direction the lights and buildings of Zagreb glittered in the distance. The sights from this ridge proved that there was more beyond the struggle of his hilltop, but hope for his future came with the loss of this view. When we were choosing the land for our home in Ohio Bob wanted the top of the hill with the open view into the valley. I now understand that his need to see the sky, the horizon and the world beyond is deep in his genes.

An elderly woman is cleaning the graves on the hill. She speaks no English and of course we speak no Croatian, but the dialect spoken on the border is very much like Slovene so we can talk with her a little. We think she is telling us that the Rapljenović families in the cemetery come from two villages, Stojdraga and another, but we don’t understand where. There is still a Rapljenović in town, but we can’t understand anything more. We think that if we go to the school a teacher of English will be able help us get some information, but the woman tells us that there was no longer a school; only old people now live in Stojdraga. We decide that when I return to Ohio in January I will get more information about grandpa’s family, and then we will go searching for the family again.

We have more unanswered questions than we can imagine. Who was grandpa’s family? Why did he leave? Did he come alone? What was his path to America? What was life like for the people who stayed behind? Our limited knowledge of the history tells us that the region was originally occupied as long ago as the early Iron Age and Roman periods. In 1094 the area was included in the Zagreb diocese, but was included in the conflicts between Zagreb and the Italian patriarch. The Ottoman Turks completely devastated the area in the second half of the 15th century and left it deserted. Following the defeat of Hungary by the Turks in 1526 the Austrian Hapsburgs established a line of military out posts in the lower slopes of the Žumberak range as border protection. They brought the Uskoks, Croatians rebels who had fought against the Ottoman army and were Catholic and Orthodox [Asian rituals, but recognized the pope as the head of the church], to serve as the border defense against the Turks in 1530. The church of St. Juraj in Stojdraga was built in the 17th century on the foundation of the original 16th century wooden Greek-Catholic church so we are assuming that some of the Rapljenović clan may have been a part of the original military defense team. [sources: “After Yugoslavia” – Zoë Brân, Wikipedia, Park prirode Žumberak-Samoborsko and Croatian National Tourist Board].

Our trip continues on the only road along this ridge. Sometimes it dives though deep forests of beech and pine trees into the valleys, farm clearings, sinkholes and caves but then winds back to the open vistas across the entire area. We are following a map that grandpa had that shows the old roads and the small towns. The entire area of Žumberak currently has only 3,000 residents, mostly elderly, and the towns do not have enough to warrant a speck on the modern map.

We think that grandma came from Reliči; her name was Mary Relič. A proud sign points us to the village up the hill and around the bend. Homes stick their stoops into the path of the one lane road while farm buildings peak out from behind. Some of the homes built of giant wooden slabs remain in the style of another time, and others are modern and prosperous. There is evidence that people live here by the lace curtains in the windows, the last of the flowers in the gardens and the sounds of cows and chickens, but we see almost no one in the village except two teenage girls coming home from school. We have a difficult time imaging how their isolated life is anything like the teenagers at home. Do they have access to modern media, internet, TV, movies? Do they giggle about movie stars? Will they have a future here or will they have to leave home as grandma did?

As we leave the village, the sight into the valley looking toward the church and her future is the same as she saw when she left her village, and the last house in town, of unpainted slab wood with decorative trim, is what she saw with her last glance of home.

2006-11-02T11:59:00.000-08:00

Reliči, Croatia

The last view of the villiage

The view to the church

Grandma roses?

2006-11-02T11:35:00.000-08:00

Grandma Mary

A few years ago I wrote a story about Grandma Rapljenovic, my vision of what I thought it must have been like for her. The pictures confirm my story.

Great Grandma Mary left her home in the mountains when she was 15 and she never returned. She wasn’t running away from home when she walked down the hill from her village carrying the small suitcase with all her belongings. She was running to hope and possibility.

Her village was gorgeous in the summer and fall. The fields were planted with wheat and other grains. The hillsides were trimmed a close deep green by the grazing of cows, sheep and goats. The forests were deep and dark places to rest from the heat. Window boxes in each home burst with the brilliant color of red geraniums that were saved from year to year. Cuttings were passed on as wedding gifts so that the blessings of a long productive marriage would carry from generation to generation.

Mary knew everyone and everyone knew her. When she took a comfortable walk to her aunts home, the women in the fields, babushkas on their heads, skirts pulled up above their knees, huge rough hands, would stop their digging or cutting and chat. They always asked whom she was going to marry, if her grandfather had gotten better now that the weather was warmer, if she had heard from her brother in the war and they asked about her roses. The woman knew the answers before they even asked the questions, but they always asked. And as she walked past them she heard them clucking their tongues as they shook their heads in pity for her mother. They thought she was a dreamer, a lazy girl who took walks in the work hours, spent too much time planting and pruning her roses and not enough time tending the cleaning of the barn.

The home where Mary lived with her mother, father, grandfather and brother was not the nicest in the village. It sat on the slope of a hill that was reached by climbing a twisty turning path from the creek bed. The animals lived in the bottom part of the building and the family above them on the second floor. The warmth from the animals helped to keep the family warm in the winter, but of course they also shared their noises and their smells. The house had a cooking room, sitting room and sleeping room. The peč cook stove, fueled by the branches collected in the forest, cooked the food in the cooking room and warmed the entire home even on the hottest summer day from the tile box in the sitting room. The sounds of the milk cow, the plow oxen, the goats, chickens and geese entertained the family night and day drifting up through the cracks in the floor. There was never quiet in this house.

A fence was built around the winter pasture to keep the animals from wandering off the hillside and into the village gardens. Mary planted climbing roses there one spring. She hoped that the glowing brilliant red of the flowers and the deep green of the leaves would hide the ragged rough fence, but day after day the buds were ripped off and the new shoots chewed with delight by the goats. So the roses had a place of their very own along the side of the house. The slope was too steep for anything to grow there and the rocks from the foundation had been left to collect weeds. Each summer beginning at age 12 Mary cleared the rocks away shaping little spaces just the size needed for a rose bush.

Mary got cuttings from the older women. Roses were only grown by the widows who lived in the homes of their children, the bent over gray haired ladies dressed eternally in the black of their loss, who could no longer work in the fields. The wrinkled useless women who were dependent on everyone for everything shaped the beauty of the village. They nurtured the geraniums through the harsh mountain winters keeping them safe from freezing. They picked the wildflowers from the groves of trees to place on the table as a moment of beauty. And they grew the roses.

All around the village roses in a yard was the sign that a grandma widow lived there. If grandpa was still alive then grandma didn’t have time to tend the roses; she had to tend grandpa. But if grandma out lived her husband she was left with only time to cure her loneliness. The other grandma widows would bring cuttings of their most precious plants to the funeral so that the new widow would have something to care for. She would gather the cuttings in a basket and the day after he was buried she could be found on her hands and knees digging a home for her new charges, and everyone knew she would outlive her sadness.

Even when Mary was very little she liked to talk to the grandma widows. She would kneel down beside them in the dirt intently watching them scrape and scratch the soil, trim the brambles back and pluck the bugs that suck the life out of their flowers. She listened deeply to their stories and when she went home she left them feeling less old.

One spring she asked for a cutting. What could it hurt the widow thought, one little cutting to bring some color to the life of this child on the hill. So the widow took a fresh shoot from the velvety red rose and gave it to Mary. Mary took this small thorny woody piece and tenderly stuck it in a clear spot next to the barn. She wrapped the base of the shoot in composted manure and straw and covered it with a glass jar. Each day she tended her new rose by taking off the jar dripping with water drops to let in the fresh morning air and sunshine, and then replaced the jar again as a protection from the evening breeze. She watched and talked to the plant waiting for a response day after day. She never tired of pampering her shoot even when her grandpa told her that she would never get that stick to flower. And then one day a nub of green appeared and she knew that her shoot had begun to root and the next summer she would have her very own roses.

Mary went one day after another to each of the grandma widows asking for a cutting of their most precious flower. Each one thought that it could cause no harm to give beauty to the child that brought them youth, so by the end of spring the sloped wall of the house and barn looked like someone had planted a crop of glass jars.

It wasn’t until the grandma widows were sitting at the same wedding table in the fall that they realized that Mary had changed the path of tradition. She was growing roses for their aesthetic beauty, the joy they brought her, the delight in watching each new shoot come to life. She was using productive time and energy to nurture roses rather than care for the garden. Mary was spending hours with flowers and her family may not have enough vegetables stored for the long winter months. Her family could go hungry because of these roses. The fear was deep in their eyes and the crevices of their faces. Mary must return to the beans, tomatoes, potatoes, cabbages, her summer days must be struggling with the garden weeds and varmints. There was no time in youth for beauty; there was only time for survival, preparing for the cold, guaranteeing that no one would starve in February and March.

They shunned Mary when she came to talk. Their fear for her put the age back on their faces. They told her to stop being foolish, to grow up, to take responsibility for her family. They stopped telling her stories and found no time to listen to hers.

As she grew older they tried their skills at matchmaking. If they found Mary a good husband she would stop this foolishness with the roses. She would be so occupied making her husband thick coffee, cabbage rolls and bread, bearing his children, pampering his home that the roses would be forgotten until he was gone. Then when she became a grandma widow she could return to beauty.

It wasn’t that Mary didn’t want to get married; there just was no one in the village she wanted to marry. Most of the village inhabitants were her relatives. Her family had never left this hillside. They were born here and grew ancient in the home that housed the same life pattern for generation and generation. Her uncle broke this tradition and left when she was 8. She remembered him as tall, big boned and hugely restless. He was always wondering what lay beyond the mountains, what you could see under the lights of the city and how much of a fortune he could make someplace other than this mountaintop. He left for America one spring before the war and before the fields were planted. He and Mary’s grandfather fought late into the night about his leaving and the fact that he didn’t care enough to plant and harvest the crops. Uncle said that if he waited for the time when there was no work to be done he would take his boat ride across the sea in a pine box. The next morning he was gone. He left a flower on the table for Mary’s mama, a coin for her dad, his pocketknife for her brother, his pocket watch for his father and a picture post card of Cleveland for Mary.

No one talked about Uncle after he left. They lived their lives as if he had never lived his. He wrote a letter to them a couple times a year. The letter sat on the table for days, no one opening it; everyone touching it when they thought no one was looking, no one asking to read it; everyone lingering around the table after dinner waiting; but not asking. Finally Mary’s mama would say, “Mary read Uncle’s letter and get it off my table.” Her grandfather would humph himself to his chair, light his pipe, but he didn’t start his normal rocking cadence; he didn’t want to make any sound that would cover Mary’s reading.

Mary read of the giant lake that seemed as big as the ocean, the rows and rows and rows of streets and houses, the neighborhood where everyone spoke Croatian, the bakery where he could buy a slice of home and eat it on the way to work. He wrote of his job in the steel mill with men from Croatia, but also Poles, Hungarians, Russians, and Irish. He told of the money he was saving so that he could own his own home, the corner bar where he sang familiar songs with the other men tears streaming down their homesick faces. Uncle knew that Mary would read the letter so he always added a postscript at the bottom, “Come to Cleveland little kitten and I will find you a rich husband.” Mary never read that line to her family; she just stopped her reading at “I miss you all, love Stanko.”

Mary did not want to marry a cousin; a boy that she had played with all her life. She didn’t want to marry the butcher who had lost his wife leaving him with 4 little children and no help in the shop. She didn’t want to marry the peddler’s son who was always sticky from the last sweet thing he ate. She knew what she didn’t want, but she had no idea what she wanted.
Mary watched her friends leave their homes and marry the boy at the bottom or the top of the hill. Elsie married a war friend of her brothers and moved to the valley, but most of the young women were just shifting locations, not making changes in their lives, not finding love or adventure, but maintaining the sameness. After the entire village celebrated the coupling Mary would wander home early. She tired of the old men tipsy on slivovitz wrapping their arms around her and breathing blessings for her marriage on plum breath. Her step was heavy with sadness, not for herself, but for her friends who were turning into their mothers and grandmothers before her eyes.

Mary’s 15th winter was the coldest her grandfather could remember. The snow piled so deep that they couldn’t get the barn door open. They cut a hole in the floor of the main room and dropped the food and water to the animals from the house. Every washday Mary would strap on the snowshoes and carry the basket of dirty clothes down through the drifts to the creek. She had to break the layer of ice on the creek with a rock so that she could reach the running water under the ice. Each week the ice got thicker and thicker and harder and harder to break. She would kneel on the snow-covered ice, wash the clothes scrubbing between the forming ice crystals and rinse them before a film of ice formed on the creek. When she finished the washing she stumbled up the hill carrying the soaking clothes to the fence by the barn. There she unrolled the frozen garments stretching out their stiffness and hung them over the fence to dry. If there was no sun for days the clothes hung crisp like a frozen scarecrow until the air finally dried them. After Mary completed this weekly chore the clothes on her own body crunched and cracked when she moved, ice crystals formed on her eyelashes, frozen droplets hung from her eyebrows and the stray hair falling from her babushka. When she went to warm herself by the stove her melting clothes formed a pool of creek water under her boots and a chill deep to her marrow.

Mary decided to leave the day after Uncle’s winter letter came. For a week the letter waited to be read as if everyone knew that this single piece of paper would change their lives for eternity.
Uncle had gotten married and bought a house. His bride Katja was from a village a days ride from Mary’s home. She spoke strong English and Croatian. She had gone to an American school and spoke with almost no foreign twist to her words. They bought their home in the Croatian neighborhood just down the street from the bakery where Katja worked. Stanko had stopped in this sweet smelling haven every afternoon on his way to his job. He would buy a slice of potica, a piece of strudel, and Italian pitzel or a Hungarian kifli. Sometimes Katja would put an extra American cookie or chocolate brownie in the bag because his innocent smile warmed her soul. Their meetings became such an important part of each of their days that soon the casual contact was not enough. Katja would ask for her afternoon break when she saw him coming so that when he walked through the door his hat in his hand she had his treat ready. They would walk across to the park, sit on a bench while he ate the warm goodies and share their own stories of home and hope.

On the day when Stanko knew he had enough money to buy the house down the street he asked Katja to be his bride. They sat so long on the bench imaging their future that they almost lost their jobs. From this moment on their talks were overflowing with plans. The house was purchased in the late summer and the wedding, held at St. Stephens Church, on a gloriously warm day circled with cool breezes over the lake. Their wedding night was spent in the freshly new double bed in their perfect newlywed cottage dreaming of the songs of children in the halls.
Stanko wrote of his beautiful wife and the home where they sat each evening on the front porch talking with the neighbors. He also wrote that in his house he could turn on a faucet on the wall and water would come out. One faucet had water as cold as the creek at the bottom of the hill and the other had water has hot as the teakettle on the stove. He told about the tub in the basement that, when filled with water, washed the clothes for Katja. Attached to this machine were two wooden rollers that would wring out the clothes so that when Katja hung them on the line they were almost dry. They had a line outside to catch the sweet Lake Erie breezes in his pockets, but also a line in the basement when the weather was cold.

Mary could not believe what Stanko wrote. She read it over and over again. Water ran out to the walls of Stanko’s new home. Katja didn’t have to carry buckets or break ice. Her hands were not raspy, raw, hurting when the cold split the skin. She had a machine that squeezed the water out of the wet heavy clothes.

By the time Stanko wrote of his happiness Katja was expecting their first American child. This child would read the Cleveland Plain Dealer to his father, answer the phone in pure unbroken English and play baseball with the passion of a natural born fan of the Cleveland Indians. Stanko’s happiness dripped off the pages, and when Mary read “Come to Cleveland little kitten and help us care for our precious baby” she knew that tomorrow she would go.
She shivered in her sleep that night fighting the forces of guilt and hope, sameness and adventure. She woke before dawn packed the little cardboard suitcase, left a note saying that she was going to Cleveland and walked down the twisty turning path to America.

Great grandma Mary lived until she was 90. She died behind her little house in Cleveland bent over her rose bushes. The east wall of her house was lined with roses, each one different than the next. There were sweet little miniature roses and huge droopy flowers. Each one started under a glass jar and lived protected from the winds of Lake Erie. Great grandma worked every morning in the warm sun scratching and scraping the soil with the same tool she had been using for over 70 years. She folded compost made from kitchen scraps tenderly around the roots, tapping them solid with her hands and humming the same modal tune over and over again.
I never heard Great grandma sing to anyone but her roses. Most of the time she would hustle and bustle around the kitchen shifting hot boiling pots and heavy pans of meat. Every time we came to her house, whether we were hungry or not, we sat crowded around the dining room table prepared to eat enough food to feed the whole city of Cleveland. No one was allowed to help her in the kitchen. She would say, “No, No get out of my way. Go sit. I bring food to you.”
Even after living in Cleveland for 75 years her English was difficult to understand. When all the family was gathered in her house and the cooking and cleaning was done she would sit heavy on a straight back wooden chair, her hands crossed her belly watching the words fly around the room. She always seemed to be listening to a foreign language, working too hard to understand, catching the laughter from the smiles not from the words.

Great grandma never went back to Croatia. She would scoff and say that she couldn’t go back to the old country because the fresh mountain air would kill her. She never saw her parents or her brother again. She wrote letters a couple times a year, but as the years moved on she became more and more of a stranger to them. They couldn’t imagine the miracle of her life in America. They would never understand that she couldn’t keep a milk cow on her postage stamp yard lined with cement driveways. They would never understand that she left her children curled deep in sleep every night, rode the bus into the dusty dark bowels of the city to clean the floors and the bathrooms of people she would never see. They would never understand that she bought her bread in a plastic bag, and the tomatoes, green beans and peas came in cans. Here in America life was easier, she didn’t have to work so desperately hard for everything. There was time in the day for leisure, time in the morning sun to tend her roses.

She bought her first rose bush in America at the grocery store. There in the produce section in front of the parsley, rutabagas and turnips was a small table with a dozen starter bushes. Each package had a girl’s name and a picture of a different colored bloom at its climax. She picked up each package turned it around and over. She drove her fingernail into the woody stem smelling if the scent was freshly turned earth or rotten leaves. She stood in front of these shriveled thorny branches inspecting each plant ignoring the other shoppers pushing past her until she chose the perfect plant to take home. She bought the rosebush instead of soap that day. She would ration the soap, use those little left over pieces for one more week so that they could have pink flowers behind the house.

Great grandpa didn’t want to dig up the grass for a flower. His tiny back yard was trimmed and pampered. He pushed the rotary mower back and forth, side-to-side and end-to-end on his miniature piece of land between the driveways. He crawled on his knees with his behind up in the air snipping the edges, and then he sat in his folding chair in the shade of the garage admiring his perfect American lawn.

Great grandpa had no idea of the significance of this pink rose bush named Baby Betsy McCall. His wife never mentioned flowers before. She was practical with her time and their money. She was nothing like those Italians who lived down the street and had red flowers dripping out of every window, lining the driveway and choking the foundation of the house. He never expected this stoic woman who shared his bed, made his tea the way he liked it with 2 squeezed lemons and a cup of sugar to care so passionately about a rose bush.

When he told her no he would not dig a hole in his lawn for a stupid flower, she stood in the kitchen clutching the shriveled plant to her breast. She didn’t say a word. She just stood there staring through him to the other side of the world. Then before she turned to go out side she quietly said between clenched teeth, “I do it myself.”

She had never defied him before. She submitted with silence to his tempers, his drinking too much with the men from the railroad and his strong fisted running of the house. She cooked the meals from the old country that he liked. She scrubbed the floors of the house weekly on her hands and knees. She washed the walls, turned the mattresses, beat the blankets and pillows in the sun each spring. She listened passively to his stories of work and his dreams of making it rich so he could go back to Croatia and show his friends and family how successful he was. There were days when she almost said nothing to him at all.

When she turned away from him and went outside he followed her to the shed yelling in Croatian for the entire neighborhood to hear. She never said a word. She crossed the yard and took the shovel to a sunny spot beneath the kitchen window. Between his curses and screams she began digging a circle in the grass just big enough for her rose. Great grandpa tried to wrestle the shovel out of her hands, but she spread her legs, locked her knees, set her hips and told him to leave her alone.

“All I do is work! Day after day the same - cooking, cleaning up after you - the children - those people downtown. I ask nothing from you. I am going to have a little beauty in my life with or without you!”

Never before had he heard her speak with this tone of passion. It was as if there was a vision behind her eyes that she needed to fulfill. She needed to be able to step back from her life remember who she was and know that her choices were good. After that when he heard that intensity in her voice he stepped out of her path and let her do what she needed to do.
The Betsy McCall rose was the first of a fashion show of summer beauties.

When Grandma Mary became a grandma widow she went to the flower shop and bought an American Pillar climbing red rose. She trained it to wander along the brick façade so that everyone riding past the house could see that an American Grandma widow lived there.

2006-11-02T11:25:00.000-08:00

Krajina, Croatia
Plitvice Lakes
Senj
Kumrovec

We visit Kumrovec, Croatia, the birthplace of Josip Broz “Tito” on the second day of our trip. The village is a restored museum town showing the workings of this town at the turn of the century. Many of the houses have thatched roofs in the old style and the displays inside the buildings demonstrate the nature of life in a typical village. The area shows the remains of its former glory. Fountains lay dry, the railroad that brought loyalists on the pilgrimage to the home of Tito is clogged with weeds, and the factory that employed the people from his village is empty. The bones of the Tito regime lay scattered throughout this valley picked clean by the vultures of nationalism and war.

Tito was born in 1892 of a Croat father and a Slovenian mother in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He attended school until he was 13 years old and then became an apprentice machinist. He worked in the automobile industry in Slovenia, Germany and Austria until he was conscripted into the Austro -Hungarian Army. During World War I he was arrested and imprisoned for anti-war propaganda. When he was released he was sent to fight the Russians where he was wounded and captured. In 1916 he was sent to a Russian work camp in the Ural Mountains where he was once again arrested for organizing prisoner demonstrations. After escaping the work camp he joined demonstrations in St. Petersburg in 1917and the Russian Communist Party in 1918. In 1920 returned to the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, [The Kingdom of Yugoslavia (southern Slavs)] joined the Yugoslav Communist Party and served as a liaison to Stalin.

In 1941 the German, Italian, Hungarian and Bulgarian armies attacked Yugoslavia and Tito as Military Commander declared a communist revolt and guerilla campaign against the Nazis. The Nazis retaliated with the killing of 100 civilians for the death of each Nazi and the killing of 50 civilians for each Nazi soldier wounded. Despite the consequences the partisans had the loyalty of the people and were able to liberate territories from both the Germans and the Italians, and in Primorska the land was reclaimed again from the Italians for the Slovenes. In the reclaimed territories provisional governments were established and Tito was named Marshal of Yugoslavia. Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin officially recognized the partisans at the Tehran Conference and in 1945, aided by the Russian army, the partisans were able to force all German regiments from Yugoslovia.

On March 7, 1945 the provisional government of the Democratic Federal Yugoslavia was created under the leadership of Tito uniting a country that had been devestated by war. Cleansing of those who had been Nazi sympathizers and those apposed to the Communist government was prominent in the months following the end of the war, and many families were forced to emmigrate to Argentina to escape imprisionment or the possibility of death.

In 1948 Tito became the first Communist leader to defy the dictates and loyalty required of Stalin. Tito established his own brand of communism that was market socialism or self management socialism where workers in state-run companies benefited from profit sharing. In 1963 the country changed its name to Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

Tito was able to hold together extreme groups of passionate Balkans by purging those of extreme nationalism and promising and delivering a modern nation illiminating class differences and promising hope and peace. He died at 88 years of age in 1980.

When there was no longer great leadership the festering hatreds from the war years and beyond exploded and the nationalism that had been white washed during the 40 years of Tito’s leadership tore villages apart.

We see evidence still of this hatred in the Kajina on our way to Plitviška Jezera. The entire area appears abandoned, left to disrepair and vandals. Large modern restaurants [gostilna] with coke signs are deserted, weeds curtaining the entrances and windows cracked with large sharp zigzagging edges across the giant picture windows that once showed people gathering and celebrating. Houses are burned, roofs caved in, riddled with bullet holes. No sign of life but screams of betrayal. Fields that once grew crops or pastured animals are fallow and wild with scrub bushes. The towns that remain no longer have towering church steeples or stores, only streets lined with independent dwellings, bare windows, unkempt paths and blank stares.

Like Žumberak, Krajina was a military zone established by the Austrian Hapsburgs in the 16th century to protect the Empire from the marauding Turks. Serbs from the Dalmatian interior who had fought the Ottoman armies were given land in Krajina in exchange for military protection. The outposts were seldom challenged so the Orthodox Serbs embedded in the area made it home. When the Turks were no longer a threat the Hapsburgs withdrew interest in the area and it became a remote poor rural community of Serbs living peacefully in Croatia. In 1941 the Croat Ustaša, with the support of the Nazis and the Croatian Roman Catholic Church encouraged the blood bath of the Orthodox unbelievers and exterminated thousands of Serbs from the area and destroying whole communities.

In 1991Serbs, afraid that the new Croatian government under Tudjman would once again inflict atrocities on the Krajina and fanned by the battle cries of Milošević, cleansed Kajina of all traces of Croat history and people from the land. Rebels efficiently acted out house bombings by lighting matches to the gas canisters that were attached to the home heating system. Churches were destroyed, villages were burned 2,200 were killed and 140,000 were refugees. Then in 1995 the Croat army reclaimed Kajina in 3 days 14,000 died, 320,00 were displaced and ½ of the Serbian population left Croatia.

Ethnic cleansing caused this gaping hole in the community. Neighbors killing neighbors. People who had lived peacefully together for 500 years, marrying, celebrating, living and dying together pulled the poisonous family stories out from under their pillows to take revenge for the sins of their fathers. Death still hangs in the air.

In the midst of this area of inhumane acts is the most thrilling natural flow of water I have ever seen. Plitviška Jezera is a phenomenon of 16 natural lakes and waterfalls that span a distance of 8 km. The karst limestone has washed away to the solid clay and rock leaving fissures and channels for the running water. Sediment collected from the flowing water solidifies over rocks, fallen logs, piles of leaves and any other obstruction to create traverstine dams that then creates enormous lakes, small pools and yet allow the water to over flow making streams, rushing creeks and waterfalls. The boardwalks all along the lakes are built of longs flattened to create a secure path that weaves above the rushing rapids and the rocking edges making access easy and walking around the lakes very enjoyable. The setting appears to be tropical yet the winter freezes the falls and the dams cover with ice and snow. The delight of a visit in the late fall is the near isolation of this breathtaking place. Despite the misty weather we savor the emptiness of the park and the feeling of being in a deserted paradise silent except for the flow of water.

We both feel so strongly the poison of Krjina and want to head to the Adriatic Sea and the salty winds that will clear our souls. We drive for hours on a new super highway and see nary 100 inhabited houses and no developed land. The valley stretches barren between towering mountain ranges naked as far as we can see. Occasionally a herd of sheep wanders into our sight tended by old people with dogs, but nothing else. Is there no water? Is the soil so shallow that nothing can be grown? Does no one want to tend sheep? Has everyone left the open plain for the tall ugly dilapidated crowded apartments in the city? It breaks my heart that people must leave their mountains or their land to live in the sterile squalor of the city. Of course if that is what they want, then they should have it, but if they desire to life in their hilltop villages is there not work that can be done that will allow them to remain at home? The role of government should be to train and assist those in rural areas to remain and breathe life again into the communities rather than watch them fade. Slovenija seems to be managing well to maintain the mountain villages around us. Tourist farms with beautiful structures and luscious restaurants dot the hillsides. The vinska cesta brings people to buy wine, the villages have a grocery, a bakery and connecting bus transport on a regular basis. The high school students leave their villages for school, but they return home for the weekend. Internet and satellite connection is available in most places and the towns have an aesthetic beauty and quality roads to reach them. The Slovenes also have not given up the old ways. They still have gardens and decorate their homes with flowers; many make their own wine and some slaughter their own hogs to make homemade sausage, salami and prušt.

The Croatian villages wear sadness in the brown/gray of the buildings, the limited number of flowers, the lack of gardens, the roughness of the roads and the deserted abandoned structures. Their shattered lives are mirrored on their faces, blank eyes; slow to smile, hesitant to make eye contact and then only glance from a down turned face.

Walking along Plitviška Jezera we met a small tour. Even before we heard them speak I was certain they were Americans. They politely made room for us on the boardwalk, they made eye contact and many greeted us as total strangers. We have the luxury of cultural self-confidence. We are secure in our world; we have never been conquered, cleansed, abused, destroyed as a people. Our standard of living so exceeds that of most of the world that we can hold our heads high with a smile and a nod.

The last day of our trip we spend along the Adriatic coast. A dark thunderstorm, pushing from the mountains, sends curtains of rain out to meet the waves during the night. The view from our room in the pink of the early morning light is the unspoiled sight of the bare naked island off the coast. As we walk along the beach listening to the waves drag the pebbles back to sea we are so very aware that this is the same view seen by the Greek sailors who landed here and the Roman soldiers that built roads along the rocky face. Senj is a walled village [again to protect from the Turks] with interior medieval squares lined with decaying buildings, broken walls, remnants of decorative windows and doorframes. Functional buildings of the 70’s step up the hillside, but prime location buildings along the sea wall are deserted with no business. The downtown hotel with the view of the harbor is closed, maybe for the season, but maybe forever. Men are standing in the early morning waiting for work buses or are they waiting for work that will not happen on this day? Wood is delivered and stacked next to the downtown buildings waiting for the man to drive up on the little green woodcutter and cut the firewood to the perfect size for the peč to warm the buildings for the winter. The hills that wash into the sea are sprinkled with new summer homes, but no older homes as we see in other places along the coast. We wonder if this harbor was protection for a navy in WWII and the city was bombed of its character and has never quite recovered.

It is a relief to come home to Slovenia, to a place of calm and rational thinking, and to a country that did not choose to destroy itself to spite its neighbors.

2006-11-01T02:07:00.000-08:00

Umbria
Aquiela
Grado
Gubbio

My best friend from high school is here to visit for a week. When I moved to a new high school between my sophomore and junior year Meryl was one of the first people I met at the cafeteria lunch table the first week of school. She has always been the kind of friend who sits up late with me remembering and laughing about our youth and talking about the issues of maturity. We don’t see each other often enough, but it is perfect when we do. Having her here is the greatest joy because she delights in absolutely everything we do. Every morsel she eats, every medieval village, every mountaintop, every shuttered window is a thrill to her. We go to Aquilela to see a 14th century mosaic floor in the Basilica of Sta. Eufemia, to Grado on the seaside, to the star shaped walled city of Palmanova for cappuccino, and then to Venice to search for treasures in glass , to the villages in Slovenia, which are beautiful even in the rain, and finally to the waltzing hills of Umbria .

We leave on Sunday for Venice. We don't know it, but it is the day of the Venice marathon. The runners start on the Brenta Riviera and finish in Venice across the causeway and through the city. The causeway is blocked, traffic is slow and confused because of homemade signs and police looking so very official in full uniform doing the Italian thing; talking, talking, talking. What do they have to talk about?

The city is the normal press of tourists squeezing into narrow passage ways jostling in the density, but it is even more difficult to maneuver because of the running lanes blocking off the path along the Grand Canal, and high water on St. Marco. Wooden platforms crisscross the piazza and pools of water lap at people’s feet gurgling up from the drains. We wander, looking, eating, drinking and shopping for little things that Meryl can resell. Miniatures of everything are made in glass, teeny tiny bugs, cartoon characters, ballerinas, Santa Clauses, even devils with giant penises; tiny miniscule details with fragile lives. The city is so intoxicating. We both are in the clutches of a historical stupor and neither of us want to leave. We find a hotel hidden away from the crowds, stay the night and have dinner of spaghetti with pesto and calamari on Via Garabaldi . The street is dimly lit except for the restaurants. The apartments above are shuttered and dark and only the locals are out and about. The other diners greet those walking by with cheek pecking and hand pumping as if each person is the most important soul in their world. We both enjoy the fantasy that we are members of this historic community that spawned John Cabot and Antonio Vivaldi.

Arm in arm in the darkness we saunter along the Grand Canal to piazza San Marco. Three café are lit and occupied; two with small orchestras that alternate songs. The small crowd of tourists, too cheap to pay the music cover charge and 15 € for ice cream, shift between the two café standing in the darkness listening to the music. A few couples claim the deserted piazza as their dance floor to waltz into romance. We choose a quiet café across the square to share a toast to long friendships, fantasy, music and dancing in the shadow of St. Mark’s Cathedral.

Monday we reclaim the car from the car park and head to Umbria. My plan is to drive along the western coastline to avoid the high speed and crushing trucks on the super highway. It is a coastal road and I expect that there will be great views of the Adriatic and lovely summer villages to pass through, but I am thinking like an American. The road is miserable and a serious driving mistake. This is not highway 1 in New England or highway 101 in California where one does not even have to get out of the car to see the glorious vistas and enjoy the sea. No the Italians leave the beauty of the sea for those who have homes in the tourist towns. We don’t see the sea at all! Instead this road appears to be an expanded farm road that meanders through the swampy areas clogged with slow moving trucks and no place to pass. I finally can stand the traffic no longer and we pull off to enjoy lunch or a cappuccino along the seaside. Everything is closed! The town is completely deserted. The modern apartments that looked over the beach are shuttered tight against the winter. The shops, restaurants, hotels, café are empty, closed tight for the “off season”, and no one was walking the beach. On this glorious warm day in October there is only a hint of the laughter and joy that people share here in the hot summer. I am certain in the heat of the summer this place and all the other towns just like it are hopping, over crowded and crazy wild. Without a doubt I am not traveling this road during the height of tourist season either.

We push on to Gubbio and the reward is great. The city claims to be the largest medieval city in Italy. The buildings are beautifully restored with stone exteriors, hotels, restaurants and shops interspersed among the ancient apartments. The market on Tuesday morning fills the lower square, stores on wheels bring the goods to the customer, rather than expecting the customer to travel the paved cow path to Perugia. Vendors greet the locals by name, calling out the special bargain of the day and the music of the moment is the sound of people connecting with each other. I find it interesting that the voice of the language here in Umbria is so much louder and harsher than the fluid chocolaty melody I hear all the time in Gorizia. The magical flavor is enhanced every evening with luscious local cuisine and wines and quiet walks along the cobbled streets.

Meryl really wants to go to Deruta. Her mother Davie had Deruta pottery when Meryl was growing up and she has collected some of her own pieces, so going to the place where all this beauty is made was a dream come true. The village of Deruta boasts dozens of pottery shops owned and operated by the artists who create the hand painted ceramic ware. The village is a speck on the map near Perugia with an isolated charm that has made a commitment to those who value the brilliant colors, the ancient designs, the slow intense hand painted artistry and the pleasure of speaking to the artists as you watch them work. It is a glorious sunny day and the town has only a trickle of buyers. In each shop the artists work on a piece, painting the designs on hand thrown pottery that has been dipped in white after the firing. Many of the pieces are classic traditional designs that include a stylized dragon. The Raffaellesco pattern is said to have been created by Raphael, the master painter and architect of the Italian High Renaissance. The dragon is “a benevolent deity, bestowing good luck and fair winds to the seagoing merchants of the era with the puffs of wind steaming from his mouth”. Other designs are adaptations of the traditional, but many of the artists have also created unique contemporary motifs. We wander throughout the town peeking in each shop, talking with the artists, comparing the designs and colors. After another gastronomic delight we return to our favorite shops. Meryl buys pieces for the gallery to be sent home and I find a treasure in my favorite colors blue and yellow for which they are so famous.

It was hard to put Meryl on the train for Naples and the second half of her trip. We both are going off alone after a deep connection that spans many many years. It feels pretty lonely without her.

2006-10-20T05:48:00.000-07:00

Branik valley

Armando's birthday celebration

Sunset Adriatic Sea

We returned to Slovenija in September for the second year after a couple of months at home. Home has become a confusing term. Is home the house that we own, but is inhabited by another family? Is home the state we have lived in most of our lives but not now? Is home the country of our birth, which seems strangely unfamiliar to us? Is home where our family lives scattered around Ohio? Is home where we have the closest friends? Is home the place where we live together and share our daily adventures? I found myself saying that I was going home when in Slovenija as I talked about returning to the U.S. and in the U.S. when talking about returning to Slovenija. No place feels like home and both places feel like home.

We concentrated our energies in Ohio to connecting with family and friends and working around our house. Fortunately the renters bought a home in June so our house was available to use when we returned the beginning of July. It is such a nice house, but I was surprised that my feelings of attachment to the place we designed and built with our own hands was without emotion. A lovely place to live, but really didn’t feel like home. We were only supposed to be in OH for 6 weeks, but because of medical tests, Bob needed to stay four more weeks. The extra time should have provided us with more time to connect with people, but it was surprising how many seemed too busy to make time for us, and how few seemed really interested in hearing about our experiences. Our return to Nova Gorica was greeted with very warm welcomes and a genuine pleasure that we chose to return to Slovenija. Maybe home is where one feels appreciated.

Bob and I are both teaching this year. He continues to teach full time at the gymnasia and I am teaching at the technical school. The technical school has about1,500 students who at 14/15 years old decided to go to school to study wood working, computer science, auto mechanics, traffic management, engineering or agriculture. Most of the classes are made up entirely of boys with just a smattering of girls. I am the English language assistant and I share teaching responsibilities with 8 English teachers. My major responsibility is to be a native speaker and engage the students in dialogue concerning a topic chosen by the teacher. In my first week I discussed advertising, an introduction to music beginning with rock music and working backwards, a discussion of the 3 pillars of change in a persons life [birth, marriage, death], the skill of asking questions and working with a basic class to help them introduce themselves and tell me what they have planned for the weekend. I continue to be amazed by the high level of conversation and discussion that happens with students who are only in their first or second year of high school. With the 4th year students I do not have to adjust my vocabulary at all and they often surprise me with their sophisticated word usage. In one class I was asked to discuss biometric ID’s and I had to do research to understand what it was and how the controversy is affecting the world. Actually I think I am learning more than my students.

Bob has a teaching schedule that suits him better than last year. He will not be bouncing from teacher to teacher, but concentrating on the European classes and seeing those students for 15 classes each week. The other 5 classes will be distributed with a teacher for a week at a time. This schedule will make it possible for him to really get to know the students and be more involved with the sequence of their learning and not just the native speaker entertainment that plagued him last year.

Last year we had months and months of trying to get our residency permit. This year should have been easier, but because we had to delay our return our residency papers, the car inspection and insurance had expired. Bob took the Twingo to be inspected, but it needed new brakes, new headlight and an emission adjustment. If all those things were repaired within 3days then he didn’t have to pay for a new inspection, but of course nothing in Slovenia is completed in 3 days so he paid again. He wasn’t able to get the insurance though with out the new residency permit so the car sat until the wheel of bureaucracy ground to a stop, the planets were aligned and it was our lucky day. Good thing we have bikes, the weather is nice and we do not have far to travel to work. Surprisingly after only 3 weeks we had all the papers in order, we both have Slovene health insurance, the car is insured and we are feeling very official.

We are living in a new apartment in Šempeter. The town is smaller than Nova Gorica and has more charm of a European village than the post WWII city. We live 225 steps from a grocery store, and within a couple of blocks of a church with ringing bells every quarter hour, 2 bakeries, 4 cafés, 2 flower shops, a pharmacy, a medical supply store, 2 meat markets, a department store, the hospital, the bus stop and a pizzeria. The ride on our bikes takes about 20 minutes on the bike path with the walkers, rollerbladers and other bikers. The European Union recently celebrated the European Week of Mobility. The focus was to encourage people to use alternative transportation to cars, and it does seem that there are many more bikers and walkers out and about. The fact that gasoline is about $5.00 per gallon is undoubtedly also a factor in the choice to use people power. The city also offers free city bus rides to encourage people to leave their cars at home so at anytime of the day people are coming and going, meeting each other, getting exercise and enjoying their community.

We are the first residents of our apartment so everything is new. We have 2 bedrooms, a balcony, a bath and a half, and a full size kitchen. The windows face northeast with beautiful light. We are hoping that from the bedroom window we will be able to see the mountains when the leaves fall off the trees. Our landlords and friends have furnished the apartment with new living room and bedroom furniture and new kitchen appliances that include a full size oven and a dishwasher. We feel like we are living in the greatest comfort and sitting on the balcony in the morning with a steaming cup of fruit tea is the height of luxury.

2006-09-28T13:18:00.000-07:00

Singing in the vineyard
Tractor full of grapes
Pickers
Zelen grapes

2006-09-28T06:17:00.000-07:00

Making wine in Slovenia

All of the Primorska region is making wine. The rains of August have stopped and the sun has warmed the grapes into a luscious sweetness. Tractors grumble on the roads pulling red, gray or green plastic crates behind on a metal platform over flowing with black-purple or golden grapes. The fruit flies are in heaven.

We pile into Joško’s ancient Russian made small land rover and bump up and up a narrow wagon path past rows and rows of grapes belonging to friends and family from the valley. How Joško knows which vines are his I have no idea, but there seems to be no confusion as to where he is going. We each have a bucket and pruning shears and we start first with the pinot grigio, then to the muscat and then the zelen, a native white grape. The cut grapes drip with sun warmed sweetness oozing sticky down my arm. Some are huge translucent bunches; the others are tight clusters wrapped around the wires and vines and difficult to cut off. The grapes are small this year, but sweet. July was a drought, August there was too much rain and September has been sunny and warm. With the high level of sweetness the wine will have a higher alcohol content, 13% is expected and no sugar will be added.

Tanya and Miloš pick their grapes and put them in a large plastic vat for 3 days. They crush and stir the mixture and keep the vat covered with a giant piece of canvas. After the 3 days they drain the juice into a galvanized vat and press the pulp in a machine to extract the remaining juice. They leave the juice to ferment in the vat with a valve allowing the gas to escape flavoring the air with a sweet tang. Over the next 10 weeks they transfer the liquid to other containers a couple of times and throw away the sediment. On 11 November St. Martin turns the juice into wine, the common drink for all occasions for the rest of the year. Homemade wine is poured directly from the vat and served in plastic bottles that once held water and no one seems to worry about oxidation or the fragile qualities of wine, they just enjoy the sweetness of the nectar of the gods.

Because Joško makes more wine than Tanya and Miloš the process is more elaborate. There were a dozen friends and family who pick buckets and buckets of grapes for hours. The crates are loaded on tractors and trailers to be dragged down the hill to the house. In the garage the sticky sweet grapes are put in a grinder that removes the stems and then the grapes are pumped into a press. The slurry sits all night to strengthen the bouquet of the wine and in the morning the press will extract the juice and send it through a tube directly to the vat in the wine cellar.

After all the stickiness is washed off our hands and tools we sit around the large table in the wine cellar and are served a meal that matches our hunger. Barley soup, fried eggplant, tomato slices, prušt, potatoes, zucchini quiche, salad, pork, chicken and apple strudel all served with 3 kinds of zelen wine that was made in 3 different vats, and each tasting remarkably different. All this food is accompanied with extreme bouts of laughter and wild attempts of speaking Slovene, Italian and English.

Once the juice is pumped into a vat it is then pumped again through a larger vat that has an outer envelope wall holding cold water, which cools the temperature of the juice. Sulfur is added to aid clarity and gelatin is added to help the sediment settle to the bottom of the vat. The fermenting juice will be transferred a number of times to clean vats and the sediment is disposed of.

While cutting grapes my partner cut my finger instead of a cluster of grapes. It was a deep gash close to the nail of my index finger that refused to stop bleeding. Since I donated my blood to the cause of this wine we have now labeled a vat “Kay’s Wine”. Each week after choir practice I test “my wine” tasting its process of becoming wine. Three days after the picking, the juice begins to have a little tang of fermentation, but still tastes good, the second week the juice flavor is even tangier, the third week the liquid was a dull cloudy mustard color and the taste no longer resembles the juice flavor. It lacks the rich sweetness, but instead is a tad bland bitter flavor. The fourth week the liquid was still cloudy, but is becoming a golden color and the flavor has the hint of wine; it is definitely taking a turn to satisfy the palate. In three more weeks the miracle of juice to wine will be complete and Bacchus and St. Martin will join hands across time for all cultures to celebrate.

2006-06-22T00:49:00.000-07:00

May poles at Three Kings Church

Alpine flowers in Podlipa

Bob snacking in an alpine meadow

Water fall below Kanin

2006-06-21T04:13:00.000-07:00

Spring has been glorious in Slovenia. The season is welcomed the first of May with May poles and bon fires. The May poles tower above every town and village. A giant pine tree cut from the forest, stripped of its bark except the top branches which are left like a Christmas tree on the tip. It is then decorated with a hanging wreath of greens, ribbons and flags. Many of the poles look as if they are just stuck in the center square with wedges holding them in. I have no idea how they are tranported, lifted, secured or even why. There are usually bon fires and other celebrations of the day, but this year it was raining so hard that many things were canceled. Guess we will have to wait until next year to understand the traditions surrounding the beginning of spring.

The temperatures have been the coldest that anyone can remember, but the consequence of wearing sweaters rather than shorts in May is that the trees and flowers have stayed in bloom for such a long time. The air is amazingly sweet with air pockets that smell of rose, lilac, mimosa, lavender, jasmine and a mixture of wild flowering trees. I have never before experienced luscious fragrance in the air that stops me in my steps and turns my head. It is marvelous!

The fields in the country are sprinkled with wild flowers of all colors, shapes and sizes interspersed in the tall grass that is cut for the animals. The cows near the town are moved from field to field to graze within pastures that are bordered by a single fence of string. Why the string around the circumference keeps them enclosed I have no idea, but they do not seem to even be tempted to get on the road; too much yummy stuff to eat right where they are. The cows also are transported to the upper elevations for grazing. No longer are herds of cows lead up the winding mountain roads, but they are loaded in the back of a wagon and pulled up the mountain behind the tractor or hitched to the car. One Sunday we went for a hike on a gravel road and followed a trail of manure drippings that looked like we were following large birds. We were so very confused as to what kind of exotic creature was dribbling up this road when a tractor pulling a wagon of 2 cows passed us. The drippings obviously came from dairy cows that were scared to death of speed and steep slopes in such close confinement. Oh how I wanted to see them run free when they finally arrived at the summit.

The woods are lush with greenery and we are trying to spend as much time as we can walking the many paths around our area. Justi Carey, an British foreign teacher, and her partner Roy Clark have written a beautiful book describing many of the hiking paths in the Julian Alps. We hiked with them on one of their favorites paths though deep woods, wild flower meadows, to a giant spring that pours from the base of the mountain to form a reservoir for drinking water, past a water fall and all in the shadow of the highest ski slope in Slovenia. They even lead us through a tunnel built through the mountain during WWI with slots in the hillside for the guns and the echo of young men involved in a ridiculous war. Throughout these mountains is the presence of the WWI soldiers. They left caves, tunnels, roads, markers, and in some areas common items are still found deep in the woods. Unfortunately their unidentified bones were also left and now rest in common memorials on each side of the border.

The cuckoo bird accompanies us with a lonely call on all our walks, but other than a few hedge hogs we see very few other animals. There is still snow on the peaks in the upper elevations so the views and the vistas continue to be breathtaking and the air is cool with the dampness of the evaporating snow. The Slovenian people take great advantage of these hiking paths and we see many with their sticks and hiking boats enjoying a lovely Sunday afternoon.

Now that we have our Twingo we take drives in the evenings to find the sunset. Around each curve we find another gorgeous valley, mountaintop, or vista. I really think that the creator sculpted and painted every view with the intent to please those who wander here. From some of the upper levels the Adriatic Sea is visible in the distance reflecting the sun, and of course from the sea the mountains tower all around. Legend says that the Creator sculpted all the other countries of the European continent from a bag of geological wonders. When the continent was finished all the pieces that were left over were put together to create Slovenia. Within a drive of 2 hours the contrast of extreme beauty is overwhelming.

We have been so very impressed with the gardens in our area. They are a work of art. Everyone seems to have land set aside to grow potatoes, lettuce, tomatoes, peppers and lots of other yummy things. The gardens are pristine with straight lines and paths free of weeds. Early sour and then sweet cherries have been offered to us by our friends who have abundance from their trees, and lettuce by the bag full as well. We have done some planting also. We both were hungry to get our fingers dirty in the soil and create our own works of garden art. I planted window boxes with basil, sage, thyme, marjoram and hanging geraniums. Since every Slovene woman has the gift of flower boxes, I wanted to try my hand at building the skill [the trick is lots of water]. I didn’t think that the plants would grow so tall that we would have to peer through the pink flowers to nosey our neighbors, but it is fabulous to open the window and pick herbs for dinner. We have also planted corn, tomatoes and American pumpkins in a plot provided by Joško and Alida. The plants don’t seem to be doing very well, but we have enjoyed driving out to the countryside and work the land in the quiet of the evenings.

This spring has been like all others in my life with choir concerts to attend and participate in. We attended a concert of choirs in the hill top village of Tabor. Three out-of-door sites were set up for the audience and the choirs rotated between the sites. The singing was all a cappella and a combination of choirs. Many of the songs were sung in dialects with fascinating rhythms and harmonies. It was magical to sit in this ancient village listening to lovely singing with the stone wall as the acoustic shell, the declining sun setting the mood and the stars becoming the spot lights. Truly a moment to remember forever.

I have been directing 2 choirs at Šolski Center; one for students and one for women teachers, as well as giving voice lessons to interested students. We had a Concert of Song evening at the theatre in the new Sports building. The concert included 4 –6 songs by each choir, duets, solos and a couple of combined numbers. All but one of the songs was in English and we have worked all year on using American sounds rather than Slovene sounds in their English. In many of the songs no one would have known that these singers were not native speakers. There are some greatly talented singers with a real desire to sing things well. I have been creating arrangements all year for these choirs, which has been a wonderful creative outlet for me. I have really enjoyed making music with these people. It has helped to develop relationships that only exist with shared experiences and I am building lovely friendships with the teachers and the students. The students sang a peace round as the encore; their faces were leaning in anxious desire to do well and their voices soared in the hope for personal and collective peace. It’s amazing! Here I am sharing in this hope with young people of another land. We are doing our little part to build tolerance, understanding, appreciation and sharing this love through song. Tears of gratitude came to my eyes. I am so thrilled being a part of this journey and so honored that these singers have joined me.

2006-05-20T05:29:00.000-07:00

March 8 is International Women’s Day. This day of celebration began in 1910 to demonstrate unhealthy working conditions for women and the IWD demonstrations in 1917 were some of the first of the Russian revolution. The day has traditionally been a time to show respect for women employees, but has now become a day like Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day to buy flowers or little gifts for the women in ones life. The main square of Nova Gorica is planted with vendors selling flowers and plants and men are seen carrying bouquets all over town. I think the US should honor this day as well. Women really do need to be reminded that all the little things they do [scrubbing bathrooms, changing beds, sweeping, cooking special meals, hugging crying children] are greatly appreciated. I wonder if there is also an International Man’s Day?

The gymnasia graduating students celebrate the end of their public schooling with the matura dance [the matura is their exit exam]. Fourth year students and their families attend a dinner in the sports complex decorated with balloons, draped fabric, long tables with table cloths, candles, flowers and runners to match the napkins. Food is served in courses from buffet tables around the room through out the night. A live band plays music for dancing beginning at 8:00pm until 4:00am and people really know how to dance. Couples glide across the floor in a style with an ease that only comes with hours of dancing together. Many of the students are almost unrecognizable dressed in floor length gowns and hours of preparation to get their hair to pile so high on their heads, but just as many are looking more comfortable in regular street clothes. The ceremony begins with a grand musical entrance to a Strauss waltz and then the entire class exhibits a fabulous demonstration of dance styles from contra dances though the tango. All the students take dance classes at private ballroom dance studios and practice all year for this moment. It is amazing to watch the students execute the dance steps with precision and joy. Each homeroom also gives a presentation [many power point photos of excursions, projects and kids being silly] and special moments of gratitude to their homeroom teacher [one teacher received a wheelbarrow full of flowers – one plant from each student]. We left at 1:00 and dessert had not been served yet and people were still going strong. The students dance until dawn when the last ones leave at 6:00am. It is especially nice to see the families in attendance. Not only parents are in attendance, but in some cases grandparents and younger siblings are gathered around the table seated with the guest of honor, their graduating student. The students have a national dance day planned on the last day of classes in May. All over Slovenia 4th year students will gather and dance their routines in an attempt to win a Guinness world record and another way to put Slovenia on that map.

Easter celebrations are many and varied. The priest blesses the trimmings from the olive trees on Palm Sunday and they are then carried home to represent the palm branches used to celebrate the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem. In Ljubljana where they have no olive trees, butar are made from dyed wood shavings and greenery from bushes that all bundled together to make a wand that is blessed at church. People make dyed eggs by hard-boiling them with the skins of onions. Some place flower petals and leaves on the eggs, wrap them in cheesecloth put them with the onionskins in the boiling water and then when the leaves are removed the designs are white on the burgundy colored eggs. Eggs painted in tradition designs are available to buy in wood, but like many of their traditional art forms I am assuming this one is disappearing too. Food is brought to the church on Easter eve to be blessed, bread [the body of Christ], wine [the blood of Christ], horse radish [the nails of the crucifixion] and eggs [shell is the tomb and the yolk is new life]. These are the first foods one is supposed to eat on Easter Sunday. Easter Saturday at Sveta Gora is the major service and is over 2 hours in length including a great deal of incense, a procession around the outside of the church [with Kay sight reading Slovenian hymns while walking around the church on the wet stones in the dark – it probably is not my best singing ever]. I have never seen anyone so excited about the resurrection as Brother Ambrose. He dances from one person to another wishing Velika No^c hugging and kissing, giggling that the resurrection has happened. After this long evening of course the choir gets together for food, wine, traditional Easter foods and lots and lots of laughter.

Our son Aaron visited with us for 5 weeks and his partner Elle for 2. This was Elle’s first visit to Europe so we were able to give her the experience of 3 countries. We all went to Cres, a Croatian island in the Adriatic. The city of Mali Locinj is a popular retreat spot for Slovenians and we headed there for a couple of days. Unfortunately the weather was rainy the entire time so we were only able to do a little bit of hiking, but there are paths all over the island, around the shore and following rock walls. The people who have lived on this island have had to remove an enormous number of rocks to find land to cultivate or to use as pasture for animals. Small plots still protect sheep in some areas, but mostly the land is left to scrub growth and the economy has adapted to the tourists who come to breathe the fresh air scented with pine and salt while walking and sitting in cafes.

We visited Bob’s family in Podlipa and went to the home of Vinko to try the spinning table. He built this wooden table following a 300-year-old tradition that has been passed through the family. The table is a little bigger than a card table standing high on 4 strong legs with a barrel secured under the top. The unfinished tabletop fits into a wooden knob on the top of the barrel and is able to move around in a circle on this knob although not easily because it was wood against wood. Eleven of us gathered around his table, we were told that the table would move clockwise if our palms were flat on the table and counter-clockwise if the backs of our hands were on the table. It took about 20 minutes of standing talking together with our hands on the table before it started to move. It slowly edged clockwise and then picked up speed as we all moved around it with our palms flat on the table, then Vinko told us to change and the table came to a complete stop and with the backs of our hands on the table it started to move the other direction. We went back and forth for a while and then people started to step away from the table leaving just 4 of us [my son Aaron, Elle, a cousin and me] and the table moved faster and faster and faster until we were running to stay with it. None of us was pushing it I am certain, it moved because we all believed that it could and the power of our thought made it happen. The room had a number of doubters and a numbers of would be believers, but when we were finished I thin everyone believed that the human brain and collective thought is a powerful thing.

It is interesting for us to try to imagine how Aaron and Elle are seeing things for the first time; these same sights that we now take for granted. How odd that the water rolling out of the mountain in Vipava, the snow capped peaks of the Julian alps, the turquoise So^ca river, the alpine towns, the coastal medieval villages, the border crossings, Friday night wine at the Italian wine bar and festivals in ancient castles can seem common place to us now that we’ve been here 7 months.

2006-05-20T03:33:00.000-07:00

Water coming from the mountain in Ajdov^s^cina,
Medieval festival at Gorizia castle,
Spinning table and Vinko
Butar and decorated eggs for Easter

2006-05-20T02:09:00.000-07:00

Matera,
house interior,
church interior,
cliff apartments,
neighborhood

2006-05-19T07:01:00.000-07:00

Interior Castle del Monte,

Castle del Monte

Monte Sant'Angelo

San Giovanni Rotondo

2006-05-19T05:00:00.000-07:00

In April the teachers from Solski Center plan an annual bus trip together for 4 days. Last year they went to Berlin, this year we all head to the region of Puglia in the south of Italy. Passing along the calm Adriatic on the route to the spur of the Italian boot are rows and rows of fruit trees drastically pruned like butchered limbs dotted with pale pink soft delicate lace on the deformed branches, and miles and miles and miles of grape arbors and olive groves. This area was thought to be once a part of the Croatian coast and the rock formations, soil and hills that should have been the foothills of the Dalmatian mountains now rest in Italy thanks to plate tectonics. For miles the area appears to be isolated, lost and forgotten protected only by old men chatting on benches dressed in the uniform of shirts, sweaters, jackets, hats and ties. Then out of nowhere a modern city with new apartments and buildings teeters on the rocks. The Commune di San Giovanni Rotondo is expanding due to thousands of pilgrimages who come to the hospital and church dedicated to Padre Pio. Padre Pio bore the stigmata of Christ for 50 years until right before he died in 1968 and was declared venerable by the pope in 1998. The faithful come from all over the world to this harsh land seeking a connection with God though this holy man who suffered the pains of the Savior, and many, many hotels and restaurants have risen to care for the pilgrims while they are here. Pilgrimages are very present in the Catholic faith here. Holy days are celebrated, the saints are remembered and given credit for natural happenings. I too feel the presence of something spiritual when I visit these sights, but more than the presence of a relic I think I feel the deep heart felt searching of those who come seeking.

In Monte Sant’Angelo we visit the hill top city where crusaders trained and received spiritual preparation before sailing from Bari to the holy land. The grotto under the church is believed to be the earthly home of the Archangel Michael and this was the second largest pilgrimage site after Rome during the middle ages. There were strong beliefs that the world would end in 1,000 so believers stopped creating and constructing in their home towns and traveled to holy sites to see the sacred relics before the end times. These pilgrimage roads leading from the British Isles to Italy intersected in France and the first tourist economy sprang up along these journey paths leading to the beautiful monasteries that housed the plunder brought back by the crusaders beginning in 195. One relic we experience on this trip is the house of Mary the mother of Jesus thought to have been brought to Italy by the angels. Actually it is a house made of stone, proven to be from the holy land from the time of Christ, that was brought by the D’Angelo family to preserve it from possession by the Muslims. It now sits within a basilica and is a place of unique smells and the feeling of warmth within the stonewalls.

Around 1,150, when it appeared that the world was not going to come to a fiery end, the faithful began to build churches in their hometowns with a focus on judgment and repentance. Those who had traveled to far exotic places brought back unusual ideas, stories of happenings and images of unusual creatures that can be seen in the designs of the churches and castles in Southern Italy. One such exotic building is the Castel del Monte, built by Frederic II between 1229 & 1249. It is a gigantic octagonal shaped hunting lodge that looms on the hill above the surrounding olive groves. The building is decorated with Eastern designs in doorways and windows carved from red aggregate, marble columns streaked with orange and trimmed with floral extensions, spiral stair cases and an upstairs indoor toilet.

In Bari, in the Basilica di San Nicola, the remains of St. Nicholas [of Christmas fame] are found. Stolen from Myra by Italian sailors in 1087 the remains have held a great fascination due to the continuous extraction of liquid manna from the bones. The presence of holy relics and people who come to worship in these places is fascinating to me. So many of the buildings are built on the Roman ruins of temples and the energy for centuries is one of seeking and believing. I find it difficult to understand the power of holy objects, but I bask in the seeking of things spiritual.

Outside of Bari we visit a producer of olive oil. Il Fratolo D’Amico processes totally biological olive oil with in 12 hours after picking the fruit from the trees. Many of the trees are ancient goddesses 3 – 400 years old standing watch within walled fields of flowers. The slow process grinds the olives by large stones. The lacrima, or the tears, pools on the pulp and is ladled in the first 10 minutes for the purest olive oil. Then the pulp is pressed on mesh discs for 4 hours and the oil that is extracted is extra virgin. The faster process grinds the olives with metal discs using centrifugal resulting in an oil of a much lower quality. I have never before tasted oil that tastes like the smell of freshly cut grass. I am definitely spoiled for life.

The place I found the most fascinating was Alberobello. This UNESCO [unesco.org] site is a community of trulli buildings, cone shaped houses, built in the ancient style of motarless construction. Legend says that the residents were able to dismantle their homes when the taxman came to avoid paying taxes on structures built on the king’s land. After he had passed, what appeared to be piles of rubble, the houses were reconstructed until the next visit. The streets weave around hobbit houses painted stark white with flat stone conical roofs capped with pieces bearing ancient symbols. The double walls are layers of flat rock over loose stone used for insulation. The interior is an even temperature all year, the walls are stuccoed and white washed with curtains separating the sparse rooms that were originally heated by the cooking fire. The children sleep in loft spaces closest to the rising warmth and water is stored in a cistern below the structure. Many of the buildings we saw are tourist shops, but the community consists of over a hundred homes that are lived in and lovingly maintained. This was once a thriving neighborhood of those who could afford no less, but now it is a prestigious place for a weekend home.

Another UNESCO site was the I Sassi di Matera. The first residents of these caves are thought to have dug their homes during the Paleolithic times. In the 1300’s this was a highly developed thriving community dug deep into the walls of the cliff. Chambers, lofts, storage areas, hallways and benches are carved from the stone and it is possible to imagine the energy of early apartment living. Churches and monasteries were also built in the same way with freschi painted on the rocks. During the time of Mussolini, running water and sewage systems were created, but due to high unemployment and the desire for that which is modern the residents moved to the “new city” in the 1930’s and many of the caves have been abandoned to garbage piles. The filming of “The Passion of Christ” was done here and some of the sections are now being restored as summer and weekend retreats.

This was definitely an eating drinking trip. People brought homemade wine and snops that was passed around the bus. At every stop the bottles and the food were pulled from bags and generously shared with everyone. We ate some of our meals at traditional restaurants sampling the cuisine and drinks of the region. I have never been too fond of bus tours, but this was a fabulous opportunity for me to get to know the teachers away from the schedule of school and build some lovely friendships that extend back to Nov Gorica.

2006-05-19T04:38:00.000-07:00

Alberobello,
Home - interior of church

2006-05-18T03:01:00.000-07:00

Walled city of urbino,
Walled olive and cherry trees,
Termoli at sunrise,
Sidewalk chalk painting,
Urbino bascilica square

2006-04-26T16:06:00.000-07:00

I traveled home to Ohio on 11 March to sing the Mozart Requiem with the Ashland Symphony and teach workshops as a Kennedy Center Teaching Artist for the state of Ohio, but mostly to visit with family and friends. I had no idea how it would feel to go home. Would I be so comforted by the familiar, the ease of understanding everything around me that I would never want to leave again? Or would the culture of excess and abundance disturb me so much that I would go running back to Slovenia? Actually I had neither response. It was indeed comforting to be able to understand announcements in the airport, read the signs and purchase a drink with words rather than waving and pointing hand signals, but now I also am able to understand all the conversations around me. Living in a country where I understand just a few words in each sentence has made it possible for me to pull in my antennas when I am in a crowd and contemplate my own thoughts rather than the thoughts of those around me [not that my thoughts are so profound, but at times they are more stimulating than conversations between couples or parents and young children]. But now that I am in the U.S. and everyone is speaking English loudly I am in the midst of everyone’s conversation. Like a magnet my thoughts bounce back and forth to the closest, loudest, most animated conversation until I have no thoughts of my own. It took me a distressingly long time to be able to block out all the nonsensical noise pollution

After two weeks of being at home I am still very confused. Home does not feel like home. It doesn’t feel foreign, but it also does not have the cozy comfort of home. The cities are lacking aesthetics, buildings are abandoned boarded up, trash is scattered along the sidewalks cluttering the grass and clogging the pours of the earth. Self-promotion blinds drivers on the roads and clutters the brain in restaurants, stores, magazines, T.V. and radio. Automobiles are enormous with only the driver in a vehicle expanded enough for seven. Music blares in elevators, stores, restaurants, competing with T.V. news and sports blasting over top of the deafening din so that we loose our voices trying to have pleasant meaningful conversation. Abundance over flows in the groceries, the clothing stores and the bookstores, bigger and more breeds so much waste that there are stores that practically give the clothes away. But it is an abundance of poor quality cheaply made garments lacking in style, quality, longevity and made by poor slaving women in developing nations. It is this cheap abundance that makes everyone in the U.S. capable of having much more than he/she needs. Does wealth lead to abundance – abundance to waste – waste to the aesthetic soulless poverty of the ugly?

Everywhere there is carryout food and drink, paper, plastic styrofoam surrounding nourishment consumed while driving, watching T.V. , dashing in a hurry. Food is simply for sustenance enhanced with salt, fat, and sugar so that it very quickly becomes unhealthy. Carryout is not even a concept that has been realized in Slovenia. Yes you can get pizza delivery, but to eat on the run is unheard of. So people include healthy food consumption together as a part of their day along with having a coffee with friends.

On an Ohio brilliant sunny blue-sky day, sidewalks are empty of walkers and in new consumer areas no one is expected to walk so the investment has not even been made in sidewalks. Drivers circle parking lots diving for the closest parking space rather than walking while concrete bleeds over the earth blocking the breath of the world. What saddens me the most is that these unhealthy manifestations of our American culture is the way the rest of the world seems to be judging themselves and they are desperately destroying their own countries to live up to our standard.

Yet in the U.S. people are more pleasant. They greet strangers on the street with a smile, a hello. They make room for others on the sidewalk or adjust their pace to accommodate someone else in their space. They talk and make jokes in an elevator and make eye contact with strangers. Americans show their private face and personality in public while the Slovenes seem to be very selective as to whom they open up to. The Slovenes are not as unfriendly as them seem, they are just much more cautious and selective than Americans.

There is also so much more diversity in the U.S. People on the streets have faces from all over the world. Food from all cultures can be enjoyed in restaurants and purchased at common grocery stores and the diversity, despite the problems, provides the U.S. with a cultural richness unknown to Slovenes.

Priorities seem to be different too. For many people I know in Ohio the priorities appear to be listed as: 1. Work 2. Family 3. Religion 4. House/yard care 5. Friends 6. Leisure time. In Slovenia the list appears to be: 1. Family 2. Friends 3. Leisure time 4. Work 5. House/yard care and religion is a part of the week for some, but it does not appear to be the same kind of social activity. Cultural priorities determine much about the way people interact with each other, how their cities are designed and how they respond to their world. In Slovenia shopping is not a leisure time activity, but hiking in the woods, on the bike path or strolling along the city sidewalks is. Therefore the U.S. has far too many shopping malls and the Slovenes have hiking paths everywhere. How wonderful that Bob and I have the opportunity to live where the collective priority list is closer to our personal list.

2006-03-12T06:31:00.000-08:00

Firenze -
Paolo Vettori e Figli violin shop -
Mario Trattoria

2006-03-11T06:15:00.000-08:00

Firenze & Pisa -
Fresco at the Barefoot Chapel -
Duomo, Firenze -
Pisa -
Sunset on the Arno River -
Leaning tower

2006-03-10T06:56:00.000-08:00

Winter Holiday

Bob had winter holiday the last part of February and we combined that with our annual wedding anniversary trip and set of for Tuscany. The train ride to Florence from Gorizia, Italy is 5 ½ hours with a transfer in Udine. We were amazed that so many people were riding the train. Every seat was taken with families, workers, business types, and elderly ladies alone, but very few non-Italians. Bob’s fascination with trains and train travel is heightened every time we travel. There are no high-speed bullet trains like in France, but the coaches are comfortable and the views are beautiful. We have not had this problem ourselves, but we know of people who have forgotten to stamp their tickets before entering the train and they have had to pay an additional fare on the train, so we are constantly reminding each other to punch the ticket in the little orange box on the platform.

I was 19 years old the last time I visited. The advantage of ancient Italian cities is that they don’t change much over the years, but the city did seem busier with more cars, more modern businesses and high scale shops than I remember. I think maybe the changes have been mine. We heard more American English in Florence than we have heard in the past 6 months. Many American universities have study abroad programs in Florence and their presence has been an assistance to the Florentine economy. The universities have purchased buildings for classes and provided apartments for their students, and of course the students are out and about spending money on eating, playing and other necessities of living in an historical community. Their presence is really evident with the number of carryout pizza deli’s and racks of potato chips with cold cokes.

We stayed just outside the old walls of the city, an easy walk to the Duomo and other attractions. We spent a long time just wandering the city, watching the sunsets over the Arno river from the Ponte Vecchio, peering into doorways that lead to hidden gardens and courtyards, entering churches that have been standing for 800 years and glancing at the tourist wares in the market. If I more than glanced in the market I was accosted by the sellers throwing out multiple languages until I reacted, and then they tried to charm me in perfect English.

We attended morning Ash Wednesday mass in the Duomo with 60 other s in a church built to seat thousands. As much as I am pulled to visit churches when I travel, the experience of sharing the intention of the building is much more meaningful than walking through as if in a museum. The vision and devotion of the faithful echoes and dances in the walls of a church and their energy is much more present when joined with others seeking the Spirit. The search for understanding of the spiritual is everywhere in ancient Florence; in the altars set high in the corner of buildings, in the frescoes that cover the walls of every church, in the paintings that decorate the walls and the sculpture that are housed in the niches.

A space that really spoke to me in an ancient tongue was the courtyard of the confraternity of Il Chriostro dello Scalzo on via Cavour. A doorway like so many others leads into a courtyard enclosed with a skylight illuminating drawings of the life of John the Baptist on the walls. The fresco images were created during the years 1509 – 1526 and have the look of monochromatic oil pastel. The figures reflect the honest look of the people of the time; faces with wrinkles, double chins and tired eyes. So many of the glorious paintings we see in other spaces are the aggrandizement of the body or the soul of the individual. The holy faces have a classic beauty, sculpted perfection or the nearly naked bodies are the study of the muscular structure, but here in this little hidden wonder the people of the countryside 500 years ago look out from their pensive thoughts and daily happenings.

We had an early morning viewing of Michelagelo’s David alone in the Accademia; there are no lines at 8:15am. The enormity and the beauty of that sculpture are breathtaking, but I delight even more in the unfinished pieces and the struggle of the lives trying to free themselves from the rock. I have read and reread The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone. In his recreation of the life of Michelangelo the young sculptor broke from tradition and chose the piece of marble by the life he saw within the stone. These souls forever jailed in stone rage against their captivity are calling to be freed 500 years after they were first discovered. Also in this museum is the first pianoforte made by Christopho in 1700. While in the employ as a court musician of the Medici he created this new instrument to be able to control the dynamics of his playing. The first instrument has not been restored and is in the same condition it was when it was found in a 20th century attic.

There are so many churches around the city with brown block undecorated fronts. We were confused as to why they looked unfinished. The holes for the scaffolding were left open and now house the pigeons when it rains. Was this the result of WWII destruction? All the bridges except the Arno were destroyed, could the facades of the churches been damaged too? A visit to the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo helped us understand that the churches took forever to complete and some still remain naked and unfinished. The façade of Santa Maria del Fiore – the Duomo, looked the same until the end of the 19th century. The cathedral was begun in the 13th century on the site of an existing church that continued to serve the parish while the Duomo was being built around it. The lower portion of the façade was completed, but left unfinished until the 1580’s when the Medici’s had it removed with the intent of completing the façade. It remained unfinished until the design of Emil de Fabris was chosen in the 1800’s and it was completed in 1887. The museum shows the designs that were proposed over the years and the drawings of other submissions that competed with the Fabis design. In addition to viewing the original art that was created for the Duomo the study of the evolution of the building is fascinating.

A high light of the trip was visiting the violin workshop of Paolo Vettori e Figli. We met Paolo and Milica in Nova Gorica and visited them in their new location near to our hotel and across the street from the sculpture garden where Michelangelo worked. Paolo, Dario, and Lapo create around two dozen hand made instruments each year using ancient wood rescued from an old barn. They have restored the carriage house of an old palace for the workshop and show room. Their vision to mold this space to meet their needs included digging a basement room from the inside. It was done mostly by hand with shovel and buckets filling 80 trucks with rubble. The front room where Dario and Lapo work has a sunny ceiling painting, large front wall of glass, a spiral staircase to the loft and the new basement and a window that opens to the back garden courtyard. They have molds and designs mounted on the walls, a glass showcase of recently made instruments and very very fine spruce dust everywhere from the detail finishing with tiny thumb planes and 1200 grade fine sand paper. We went to Fiaschetteria-Trattoria Mario for lunch. This typical Florentine local restaurant has been serving home cooked meals since 1953. The space is crowded with tables, the cooking happens behind a glass wall in plain view, regulars greet the family cooks by name, tourists watch wide eyed as this circus of serving delicious and fast lunches unfolds in record speed with the song of laughter everywhere. Bob shared a Florentine steak with the Vettori family and melted with the taste of the biggest hunk of rare meat I have ever seen at table. He couldn’t stop saying how wonderful it tasted. I enjoyed the prima course of pasta and then salad, grilled peppers, potatoes, local wine and finished with biscotti dipped in a liqueur and a light fluffy Florentine cake [I think all the traditional foods are called Florentine]. The bread in Florence though has great texture, but a very bland taste, no salt. Like everything else in Florence there is history in the bread too. 800 years ago Pisa was a port city because the Arno was wide and deep enough for sea vessels to travel. The tariffs on salt imposed by the Pisans were so high that the Florentines refused to buy the salt and therefore began making bread without salt. Now 800 years later the tradition continues. For those of us who are fascinated by tradition it oozes from every pour of this city.

On Shrove Tuesday we traveled by train to Pisa and then to Viareggio. The best thing about Pisa is that the tower still leans and tourists come to see and feel the amazing energy within these walls. The crystal white buildings shimmer in the sun framed by the royal green grass and the rough blocks of the city walls. We then trained to Viareggio for the carnievale and the gigantic parade of floats. The city is a beach town on the Mediterranean coast with miles and miles of soft sandy beach. The parade takes place on the street along the beach and people gathered are in a rich array of costumes. There were none of the wealthy elaborate costumes of Venice, but many families were adorned with funny hats, masks, glasses and silly costumes. Most of the floats had national and international political statements. The face of George W. was clearly the most popular image with strong statements about American politics.
We greatly enjoy going to places in Italy, but the Slovenes we know are not as excited about things Italian. In this area where the fascists had control for 25 years the people still have long resentments that their names were changed, that they were not allowed to speak their own language and that the Italians were awarded cities and land that had always been traditionally Slovene. Some boys at school were telling Bob that when the Slovenian partisans were fighting WWII in this area they could have moved further into Italy, but because of natural and cultural borders they chose to stay in the area where Slavic languages were spoken, but that consideration was not given to the people when the allies drew the boundaries. Resentments live on for generations.

2006-03-09T06:43:00.000-08:00

Parade floats in Viareggio

2006-02-26T17:16:00.000-08:00

Costumes for Carnevale in Venice

2006-02-26T16:43:00.000-08:00

The beginning of Spring in Slovenia.

It is time to celebrate the end of winter and the beginning of the Lenten season. Buds on trees and bushes are beginning to pulse and swell and everywhere there are preparations for Carnival. In Slovenia the celebration is called Pust based on pre-Christian traditions of driving the winter away to allow room for the spring to come rolling in. There are a variety of celebrations around the country each with its own traditions and costumes. The celebrations culminate on Shrove Tuesday where many of the floats and costumes are burned along with the negative bad feelings from the past year. Then after Ash Wednesday people fast [post] giving up the fatty foods and meats that kept them warm in the winter and prepare their hearts, souls and gardens for new life.

The Kurenti, which at one time were believed to have the power to chase away winter and usher in spring, are the central figures of the annual Kurentovanje festival.
The Slovenian rite of spring and fertility is called Kurentovanje. This event is celebrated for 10 days. Although the origins of Kurentovanje festivities are obscure, the celebration may have come from earlier Slavic, Celtic or Illyrian customs. Similar traditions are found throughout Central Europe in parts of Croatia, Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria and elsewhere.
Kurentovanje is a distinctive pre-Lenten festival. The name comes from the festival's central figure, the Kurent, who in earlier times was believed to have the power to chase away winter and usher in spring. During this extravagant festival, Kurent, the god of unrestrained pleasure and hedonism, comes to life. Groups of Kurents (kurenti) dress in sheepskins with cowbells hanging from their belts. They wear furry caps decorated with horns, streamers, feathers and sticks.

The Kurent mask is a major work of folk art in Slovenia. The masks are made of leather, with two holes cut out for the eyes, and a single hole cut out for the mouth. The holes are surrounded with red paint. A trunk-like nose is attached, along with whiskers made of twigs and teeth made of white beans. The final touch is a long, red tongue which dangles down to the chest.
The Kurents travel throughout the town, moving from house to house to scare off evil spirits with bells and wooden clubs that are topped with hedgehog spines. A devil acts as the leader of the procession. He is covered in a net to catch souls. The Kurents are presented with the handkerchiefs of young girls. These gifts are attached to their belts. The people of the town smash clay pots at the feet of the Kurents for good luck and good health.

This info came from www.snpj.org. We attempeted to go to Ptuj where they have the largest Kurent festival, but the bus connections made it impossible to get there. We will try another year when we have a car. In other festivals the creatures paint their bodies green using leaves and growing things as decorations with bells to scare away the winter. These festivals are accompanied by costume parades, little children begging for candy from house to house, playing tricks on people and lots of parties with good food freshly made sausage and salami, and flansiti [a delicately thin fried pastry similar to elephant ears at the fair]. I went to the Karnival parade in ^Sempeter and there young men were dressed in the kurent costumes along with floats that made political statements about bird flu, the introduction of the Euro next year and the mayor who was being accused of being a gypsy.

Venice is all decked out in splendor for Carnevale. People from all over the world elaborately dressed in masked costumes stroll slowly under the porticoes posing to be observed for picture taking. Many of the designs are traditional baroque clothing excessively decorated with rococo in gold and bright colors, but others are elaborate statements of fancy in even more brilliant colors. Friday was the fashion show and the judging of the best costume for 2006. One of the judges was a famous Italian actress so the paparazzi were all over the place trying to catch the perfect photo of Miss Beautiful in her 18th century gown. The atmosphere was a frivolous elaborate pretense but the quality of the costumes and attention to detail was unbelievable and most of those who were unmasked seemed to be middle age and having a fabulous time.

At choir practice the celebration of sausage continues. Jo^sko cut his first homemade salami to share with us all. The carving was preceded with a speech sharing that he does not make sausages and salami just for himself, but for his family of relatives and friends and he wants to share the first flavor of the year with those of us in his choir. We toast Jo^sko with Na zdravje!, and everyone [except me] study the color, the texture and savor the taste of the new sausage. Dober, dober [good] is echoed around the table and more salami is gobbled up with bread, cheese and pickles. The wine this week is a different wine. Jo^sko was really surprised that I was able to discern the difference in the flavor, but this white wine has a greater depth of flavor, a richness that is different than that which he usually serves. He calls it a zelena [green] wine made from a grape unique to the region. Most of the wines are from French grapes, but this is a grape that is not often grown and the flavor is mixed and blended with a large dose of Slovenian pride. He offered me 100 congratulations because of my abilities to discern, and brought out the grand ringing crystal glasses for me to swirl, sniff and then taste. The glass did not make it taste better; I think I would have liked it even in a paper cup. Jo^sko’s wine is not aged in barrels, but made in and served from large stainless steel vats. I think the alcohol content must be low because the texture is light and easily consumed with very little residual affect. But I am discovering and there is so, so much to learn about wine.

I am experiencing a language break through!!! For 3 hours on a rainy cold Monday I studied Slovenian grammar trying to make sense of cases and declensions. Every noun or adjective takes a different ending depending on how it is used. So one must consider the four declensions 1. a feminine noun ending in “a,” 2. a feminine noun ending in a consonant, 3. a masculine inanimate or animate noun 4. a neuter noun ending in “o” or “e”. And there are no articles as in French or Italian to tell you the gender. Then depending on the use of the word the endings change in the different cases. The nominative case is easy – the subject of the sentence – no changes. The genitive case is the direct object of all negative verbs, 1. “a” becomes “e”, 2. consonants add “i”, 3. “u” is added to masculine noun [Robertu], 4. “o” and “e” become “a”. Each case has its own set of rules [plus the million exceptions]. The dative case is use for the direct object when something is done for someone or something. The accusative case is used when seeing someone or something. The locative case is used for location. The instrumental case is used with someone or something, and each has 4 declensions. And I haven’t even mentioned plural or dual [if there are 2 involved]. So for a simple word like table [miza] you have 1. miza, 2. ni mize, 3. mizi, 4. mizo, 5. mizi, 6. mizo, and plural 1. mize, 2. ni miz, 3. mizam, 4. mize, 5. mizah, 6. mizami. The breakthrough comes with understanding this. I can’t do it, but I understand it. Finally when I hear a word I can discern the root word and recognize that there is an ending and not become debilitated because of the different sounds [oh by the way sometimes the words are then pronounced differently or stressed differently because of the ending too]. Slow I plod along one word at a time, one phrase at a time and eventually I may be able to create an accurate sentence.

2006-02-26T15:58:00.000-08:00

Pust Celebration in ^Sempeter

Kurant costumes

An advertisement for a bank that shows a "real Slovene" man and his love of sausage.

2006-02-20T09:08:00.000-08:00

Trimming the vines in the vineyard near Dornberk

2006-02-19T22:29:00.000-08:00

Legal in Slovenia!

We have finally received our documents to stay and work in Slovenia!! We have been here 5 months, and it has taken this long to wade through the pylons of paper that balance the bureaucracy. I have no idea how Miha Rossler from the Slovenian Embassy in Washington realistically expected us to complete this process before we left the U.S. First we needed both a contract for work indicating the monthly salary and a contract for housing that indicates the amount paid for rent. The school did indeed send a contract to Bob at home, but it arrived a month after he had been teaching and had already been paid, and of course we needed to see the apartment before we would sign a contract for a year. With the two contracts and our passports in hand we first registered our presence in the city with the police as tourists and became legal for 3 months. With that stamp of approval from the city Bob applied for a work permit, but the work permit was only issued for the 3 months of our tourist registration. When he received the work permit he applied for the residency visa, but since the visas are only issued for the calendar year he was only legal for a month until the end of December. The process could not begin for me until my man with the work permit was legal so after 3 trips to Trieste, Italy to the Slovenian Consulate I too was legal, but for only 2 weeks. Then in 2006 we started the process again! After proving that we are not criminals in 2 countries, purchasing insurance in 2 countries and getting little round purple stamps on a pile of documents we are not able to read, Bob was finally issued his visa from Miss Amelia in the office of foreign workers in Nova Gorica. Ten days later I have my beautiful multicolored visa pasted in my passport and until the end of August it is legal for us to live here. I am not able to work legally without a work permit, but I am able to earn a little spending cash with concerts and English conversation tutoring for students.

Every Wednesday after choir practice the singers continue to socialize with homemade wine, homemade sausage, homemade ^snops, homemade pork rinds and often more food than we certainly need to eat at 9:30 pm. The vegetarian in me is a tad squeamish about all the pork by products, but I do understand there is real art in the raising, slaughtering, preparing and sharing of these delicacies. After careful preparation the salami hangs in a room of specific humidity air-drying for a month and when the creation is perfect the artist slices his salami into little pieces as if he is sharing his most precious sculpture with an adoring public. There is social tradition stuffed in these sausages as well. Men share the work dressing the pig, they have competitions with blind judging for the tastiest sausage and they gather with their friends and family to share the specialty of the house. Hogs are a part of many celebrations as well. The choir sang for a 50th wedding anniversary mass and to thank us the couple served a young pig roasted on a spit and presented whole. And all of this hog activity happens during the cabin fever months bringing people together around fires and glasses of home brew.

For 7 hours we shared the work in the vineyards with Jo^sko and Alida on a glorious sunny clear Saturday. The vines need to be deeply pruned so that the grapes will grow big and juicy from the new growth. They cut off all but 3 or 4 eyes and discard the rest of the vine. Bob follows Jo^sko while I follow Alida. They cut, we pull, removing all the old growth. The grapes are grown in different styles. Some of the vines are 30 or 40 years old and are twisted down from above and tied to lower wires in the style of Jo^sko’s father, while others will twist around the wire at the same level as the top of the trunk. The vineyards are terraced on the hillside with grape vines everywhere in view on all the hillsides around. Jo^sko has acres of vines that need pruning in the early spring, but care and cleaning every week during the summer and picking and preparing in the fall. The fruit of his labor is song and laughter in his wine cellar every Wednesday night.

We invited an American doing research at the Poly Technical Institute for dinner this week. Stephen is here for 6 months on a Fulbright studying issues of environmental chemistry. The 3 of us sat over dinner and never stopped talking for 3 hours. It was so good to be able to talk with someone with common experience and point of reference. The inability to converse on a level of deep understanding continues to haunt me. I test on the cusp of introvert/extrovert on the Myers Briggs test so that when I am comfortable I am very extroverted, but when I am in unfamiliar territory the introvert takes over. This is one of the reasons I don’t like to parties, because the noise makes it difficult to talk and there are usually too many people I don’t know. Living here without the language sends me into introvert survival hide in a corner mode. I am observing a lot, learning an enormous amount, but the extroverted Kay is feeling sorely neglected.

St. Valentine blesses the plants and opens up the growth of the roots in Slovenia. The result of his blessing is evident already with the snowdrops blooming, the pussy willow bushes fluffy with fur, little yellow crocuses smiling in the sunshine, and near our home I saw a male and female pheasant cavorting in the long grass. Spring is just a breath away.

2006-02-12T11:06:00.000-08:00

Skiing in Slovenia

A drink at the bar?

Easy slope?

View from Kanin

View from the lodge

2006-02-10T05:56:00.000-08:00

Ski Adventure in Slovenija

The Gimnazia takes first year students [9th graders] to Bovec for 3 days to ski Kanin. When they offered me a trip to ski, if I would do activities with the students in the evenings, the adventure was too great to refuse. Bovec is a village nestled in a bowl surrounded by iced peaks stretching for the heavens and leafless hillsides leading from the valley like the nap of a sculpted carpet or the stubble on the chin of a teenage boy. The mountain of Kanin looms 1765 meters [5790 feet] above Bovec. Slovenes and French privately own the ski area with a plan to open the slopes to the Italian resort on the other side of the mountain in the next year for international skiing. This is not a resort. There is no roaring fire and cozy lounge chairs. This is a place for serious skiers. The gondola shed/ski lodge is a metal building with a bar, a cafeteria and hard wooden chairs. The only redeeming quality is the view.

The gondola floats silently straight up the mountain stopping at 3 stations along the way. The “easiest” slopes are at the top, but easy is a creative description. There is nothing easy about any of this. The climb from the gondola shed to the towline carrying skies, poles and walking in inflexible plastic boots for the first time is almost enough exercise for the entire day. The tow is a circular disk that is shoved between my legs by the grunting slope worker that then jerks me upward flinging to the top of the hill. When my skis cross at the tip [which they are want to do on a regular basis] the ride comes to a screeching stop and I am twisted and tangled with poles, skis sliding into the path of the next skier on the tow. I thought the bindings were supposed to release on the skies to keep me from breaking my leg! Instead I need the assistance of 2 strong men to pounce on the bindings to free my boots. They were able to carry my skies to the top, but my only means of transport was crawling like a baby on my hands and knees. The personal humiliation is of course intensified by the 4 year old who dashes zipping past me on his cute little skies while I try to crawl out of his way.

“Skiing is like riding a bicycle – you never forget”, but I haven’t been on this snow-covered ride since before Aaron was born [he is now 30]. I do remember how it is supposed to feel, but my muscles don’t remember how to do it. Crouch, lean forward, snow plow, knees together, dig edges into the snow – sounds easy, but just as often as not I would go the opposite direction than I intended. On a large open slope this would be no concern, but on this “beginner” hill there are beginning snow-boarders sitting at the end of the tow, they are scattered prone all over the slope and their jackets are in a pile in the middle of the hill. An obstacle course is rarely the chosen path for an out of shape out of control skier who has a chronic tip-crossing problem. I think the Olympics in Torino should include a style of skiing that mandates tips crossed at all times – I would be a gold medal winner.

Sometimes [no often] the concentration of keeping my skis in “pizza slice” position with a grapefruit between the tips was distracted by the sun sparkling in the distance on the Adriatic Sea, or the echoing mountain ranges rolling to the coast, or the layered rock rising above me against a deep blue sky like building blocks stock piled to be used later for government buildings, or the intensity of the heat from the sun at 2250 meters [7,395 feet].

“Skiing is the Slovenian national sport”. Only 2 of the 70 students do not have their own equipment. Ski outfits match the boots, the gloves, the hats and goggles. This is a serious sport. I’m just thankful my friends lent me warm clothes, equipment and my mother sent me warm gloves for Christmas.

By the end of the first day I am no longer falling, the tow is a relaxing amusement ride, the sense of control is better and I am no longer causing fear in the hearts of the other skiers. By the end of the second day I think I am ready for the next hill. Alan, the high school student who has been giving me a little bit of guidance in very hesitant English does not agree. I throw his caution to the wind and climb on the 3-person chair lift to heaven. Fortunately I ask Alan just as we are about to embark from the chair lift for last minute instructions. All he says is “Go left.” [This is the point where I am really wishing that his English teachers had been very insistent that he be able to communicate in a second language]. What he didn’t tell me is that going either right or left is going to take me to the depths of this mountain. Getting off the chair lift is an exercise in extreme skiing. If I lean right I tumble over the cliff immediately, if I lean left the dive over the cliff is delayed a few minutes. Of course I am sitting in the far right seat and the moment I take to register fear is just long enough to almost get knocked in the head by the chair lift. [There is no mercy for the ignorant here!] Of course I follow Alan’s directions and go left, but the sight of the black diamond slope just a slip and a slide away from my crossed skis replaces the tiny bit of confidence with FEAR. I maneuver in pathetically slow “pizza” position along the narrow ridge to the gathering spot for the other “beginner” students. Here Alan sends the others on their way pa^cas [slowly]. It looks steep, but they seem to have a handle on their speed and form and I gather confidence. Alan looks at me with disbelief but coaxes me on my way. I do fine slowly leaning right into the hill, but when I turn to go the other direction my edges do not cut in, I gather speed and I careening completely out of control down the hill with way too much speed toward a drop off that has only a single rope as a warning. Fear is the wrong thought process, but as the drop off looms ahead and I am tumbling toward an unknown precipice the toddler survival technique sets in. “Sit down and hold on tight!” The bindings keep a death grip on my skis, so tuck and roll is impossible with my feet stretched to 6 feet long. The people on the chair lift above call out uredu? [OK?], and all I can do is laugh. Laugh because here I am at the top of this nightmarishly steep slope and somehow I have to get down, laugh because I am not hurt and laugh because it is a better choice than crying. After knocking Alan down he is able to hoist me up and I try again. But fear has its ugly little claws wrapped around my throat and the cliff with the unknown bottom is calling my name. I collapse into a pathetic heap, take off my skies; give them to Alan and I walk slowly down the mountain and sit the rest of the afternoon sipping cappuccino and staring at the top of the world.

Kanin is not the best place to be a beginner, but I was not going to let this mountain beat me. The next day I stay on the smallest slope, I stop thinking about “pizza” position, I keep my knees parallel the way they remember from 35 years ago in Colorado, I stop thinking about my skis and feel the flow of my body leading my torso to the direction I want to go. Now I am really beginning to have control, I am not falling and it is exhilarating. The third day is too short. I think I would have tried the bigger hill if I had one more day, but it will be waiting there for me when I return.

When I moved to Colorado 35 years ago I intended to stay there in the mountains forever. I was always looking upward circling around and around never taking my eyes off the colors, textures, and shapes of the mountains. I was in love with the mountains and I claimed them as mine. When I fell in love with Bob the flat fields of Ohio came along with him. The pain of unrequited mountain love was so great that I never returned to Ft. Collins or Rocky Mountain National Park. I was too afraid that my passion for the mountains would force a wedge between Bob and I and I would be discontent living the breadbasket of the U.S. Here in Slovenia the passion for the mountains is rising rapidly, the beauty pulls tears to the surface and sobs of longing for the mountains rise from my soul. Fortunately Bob is here to share this with me.

While I was skiing Bob was partying in the home of the American Ambassador Thomas B. Robertson and his wife Antoinette. The Embassy sponsored an essay-writing contest for students in the European classes. The students were asked to write about how the Slovenian and American cultures can learn from each other. Fifty students submitted essays and Bob was on the committee to read the top ten essays and choose the strongest three. The three winners receiveda lap top computer and the other seven received books. All were invited with their parents and teachers to the Ambassador’s residence for a celebration and American desserts. He enjoyed the opportunity to see the home and meet and talk with the Ambassador and his staff.

Ambassador Thomas B. Robertson is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service with the rank of Counselor. Robertson began his career in the Foreign Service in 1981, serving overseas in Moscow from 1982-84 as aide to the Ambassador, and as Political Officer in Bonn, Germany from 1984-86. From 1986-89, he was Deputy Director for Exchanges in the Office of Soviet Union Affairs at State.

In 1990, Ambassador Robertson moved to Budapest, Hungary, where he was Chief of the Political Section. He worked in the Office of the Special Coordinator for Counter terrorism 1993-94, as Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for European and Canadian Affairs in 1994, and as European Specialist in the Bureau of Legislative Affairs from 1994-95. Ambassador Robertson was the Law Enforcement Counselor at the American Embassy in Moscow from 1995-1997.

In April 1998, he returned to the Embassy in Budapest as the Deputy Chief of Mission, where he served until March 2001. From March until August 2001, he served in Hungary as the U.S. Charge d'Affaires a.i.

Ambassador Robertson worked at the National Security Council as Director for Russian Affairs beginning in September 2001. In 2002, he returned to the Department of State to serve as a Career Development Officer in the Senior Level Division of the Bureau of Human Resources.
Before entering the Foreign Service, Ambassador Robertson was a guide and then an Exhibit Manager with the U.S. Information Agency, working on cultural exhibits in the Soviet Union, Hungary, Romania, and Zaire from 1975-81. He has a bachelor degree from Princeton University, masters from Johns Hopkins School of International Affairs, and has studied in Germany, the Soviet Union, and Italy. From 1997-98, he studied at the Naval War College in Newport, RI. He speaks Russian, German, Hungarian, and some Slovene, French, and Italian.
He is married and has two college-aged children.
Copied from www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/biog/37273.htm

February 8 is France Pre^seren Day, the National Slovenian Day of Culture . Pre^seren was a poet who lived in the early 1800’s in Ljubljana. He had a life of unfulfilled love, disappointing work and too much drink, but his poetry is celebrated with a holiday, a statue in the main square of the capital and a portion of his verse is used for the national anthem.

God's blessing on all nations, Who long and work for that bright day, When o'er earth's habitations No war, no strife shall hold its sway; Who long to see That all men free No more shall foes, but neighbours be.

On this day the entire country closes down to celebrate culture. The schools, stores, banks, and businesses are all closed; you can’t even buy a loaf of bread. There are cultural programs of singing, dance and poetry readings broadcast on TV. The museums are free, the children are reciting poetry, there are local, regional and national song writing competitions and the flags are flying proudly. It is interesting that in the US we have days celebrating politics, but does the average person even know when Robert Frost, Emily Dickenson, Oliver Wendell Holmes, or Edgar Alan Poe lived?

2006-01-29T15:48:00.000-08:00

Slovenian language

It has been a bad week for language. This week I insulted a woman I am very fond of at English conversation group by using the familiar greeting rather than the formal. She was “shocked” by my familiarity and firmly corrected me in an email the next morning saying, “only English have forgotten the use of thou.” Unfortunately the book I am using to learn the language has many familiar conversations and in my enthusiasm to use my Slovene I forgot all about the formal. I knew I had made a mistake the minute I said it by the look on her face. But by the time I sorted out if ‘vi’ is used for formal or just plural and is it what I should have said or should it be ‘ste,’ she and Bob had moved on to talking about something else. In English I am very uncomfortable talking with people the age of my parents using their first name so it is normal for me to call someone Mr….. or Mrs….. even if I know them well, but here so little is automatic except saying things wrong. The use of ‘thee and thou’ has not been used in the English language for centuries and then it was the familiar usage while ‘we’ and ‘you’ were the formal/plural. One explanation on the internet on why the two forms faded from the English language from Larry Trask quoting Leith saying “…16th-centuryEngland, in comparison with most other European countries, was characterized by a fluid and prosperous middle class, in which rapid rise was possible by entrepreneurial success. England, he argues, therefore lacked the comparatively rigid social structures typical of other countries, at least as far as the middle class was concerned. Whereas every speaker of French or Spanish knew his own station and knew that of everyone else, so that power-based non-reciprocal usage could be readily maintained, a middle-class English person was by comparison insecure: he could never quite be sure whether a stranger was an inferior, an equal, or a superior. Therefore, Leith concludes, the reciprocal use of `you' rapidly took hold among the middle class as the safest option, as a safe way of avoiding giving offense to a person one might need to do business with or ask favors of.” [Linguist list 7.599 http://www.quaker.org/thee-thou.html]

Unfortunately Gordana’s response sent me into a wave of tears of frustration. This language is so complicated with all the declensions, cases, endings, word orders that after 5 months I still do not have a friendly greeting correct. It seems that no matter how I use the language I use it incorrectly and it is causing me to be afraid to open my mouth to say anything in Slovene.

When someone does try to help me I am sadly usually more confused than I was before I asked. It seems to be a national condition that the Slovenes are unable to give a simple answer. They have to give me every possibility that I would ever use in my entire life and in every possible situation. So, to the question “How should I greet a woman who is my senior with respect?” the answer would go something like this:
“You could say ‘Hello, Mrs….’, or you could say ‘How are you today Mrs…..’ but if you are uncertain of her name you can just say ‘How are you today?’, but if you are really interested in how she is you could say ‘Are you doing well?’, but if you really don’t want to get the run down on her medical problems you could say ‘Have you had a nice week, Mrs…?’, but again if you don’t know her last name you can just ask her ‘Have you had a nice week?’, but don’t say ‘Hi, how ya’ doin’?” because that shows familiarity, but you could say ‘Hi, how are you?’ as long as your tone of voice does not sound to familiar, be certain to be really sincere in the greeting, but if you are too sincere you may get more information than you want. Is that clear?”

By the time the answer to my simple question is completed I have forgotten the original question, and I still don’t know one consistent way to say hello. And sadly this is the process with any question about word usage. I’m feeling, as I know less now then I did in September. How is that possible?

I also am still taking Italian classes for ‘stranieri’ [foreigners] in Gorizia. The class has diminished in number from about 25 to around 10 since October, and I am one of the ones hanging in. All the people in the class, except me, live in Italy and use the language daily so they are able to communicate more easily than I. They rattle on and on in Italian while I have a hard time discerning if the language that is coming out of their mouths really is even Italian. Speaking Italian with an accent from Bangladesh or China or the Ukraine sounds very different, to my ears, than the language of the teacher. She seems to understand them well, but I get that big-eyed glazed stare as my brain cells are searching and searching for something recognizable. Yet I understand the written assignments better than most and the women on either side of me are always checking my paper for understanding of the assignment, but if I try to have a conversation with them I understand nothing!

I missed class twice this week because I chose not to ride my bike up the hill in the snow in below freezing windy temperatures. The next time I attended class I understood nothing! Not a thing! It was as if I was in the wrong class and they were years ahead of me in their understanding. The people around me seemed to understand the readings, while I was madly flipping through my dictionary. It was as if my brain just shut down and said “No more! Two new languages at the same time is a kind of insanity I will not support.” So the lesson learned is never miss class, study harder, watch out for strange accents, smile constantly and nod a lot.

My struggle with these languages causes me to be more and more impressed with the fluency of the people around me. Gordana [my senior friend who was so shocked by my familiarity] is from a Croatian family, lives in Slovenia, takes senior classes in Italy, studied medicine after WWII in Germany, and started studying English 4 years ago when the Mormon missionaries in Italy began offering classes. She speaks Croatian, Slovene, Italian, German and English fluently. She is able to discuss subjects of great depth with me in her newest language, and I just sit in amazement.

A subject actively discussed by many people around us is the reawakening of President Dr. Janez Dernovsek [Slovenia has a president and a prime-minister]. Dr. Dermovsek underwent surgery for a malignant tumor of the kidneys in 1999. Since then the disease has metastasized into his lungs. He has rejected traditional and alternative medicines and has moved to the country, eats no animal by products, makes his own bread and follows a strict exercise routine. He is quoted as saying; “If we are afraid of something and dwell on it, then we invite it to happen. Everyone needs to be open with themselves, have their thoughts in order and change their attitude towards the world.” In following his own advice he has begun taking an active role in encouraging the United Nations to strengthen their humanitarian involvement in Sudan, he went to Bolivia for the inauguration of the first indigenous leader there, he has presented a plan for the independence of Kosovo and he has called on the parliament of Slovenia to resolve the issue of those of other nationalities who were residing in Slovenia when independence was declared in 1991. Since his illness he has immerged as a strong voice in the Balkans and is the cause of much discussion over coffee. [For more information about Dernovsek and Slovenia go to the English newspaper http://www.sloveniatimes.com/ ]

The days are getting longer and although there were gigantic icicles hanging from the drips in the tunnel this week we know that soon we will not have to wear layers and layers of clothing to keep warm on our way to town.